


The Sword of Gryffindor

by fallingflurry



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Consensual Rape Kink, M/M, Rope Bondage, Spanking, consensual but neville is seventeen, i've become such a sucker for this doomed pairing, kind of a dom/sub thing, mentions of the carrows aka mr and mrs child abuse, otherwise it's surprisingly safe sane and consensual in later chapters???, really though what the fuck is up, some non negotiated slapping, some talk about torture, specifically Neville's parents, the sword of gryffindor is neville's dick
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-25
Updated: 2017-10-28
Packaged: 2018-12-06 23:03:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 15
Words: 58,322
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11610783
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallingflurry/pseuds/fallingflurry
Summary: “Do you feel strong hitting me?” Neville spits out. He doesn’t think he’s ever been this angry before, but there’s something else too. He wants to feel it again, the pain, wants to control it like he did last time. This isn’t like Amycus Carrow driving his wand into his shoulder blades while whispering about his parents, this isn’t sitting scared in a school bench while his sister rants about muggles with a crazy glint in her eye. A choice. He’s in control here, he can take it. “Do it again you fucking coward.”





	1. Chapter One

Snape is making them wait again. He likes to do this just out of spite, Neville thinks, because he thinks it makes him look powerful or something. It’s just a ploy, though. What could he be doing that’s so important? He doesn’t teach any classes, the Carrows take care of most of the other school work. All Neville actually sees Snape do is show up sometimes at dinner in the Great Hall and make some speech about how “the Dark Lord is a blessing” or whatever. He can’t possibly be spending his days writing those speeches. They make him sound like a religious fanatic, and not one of the happy ones.

Neville looks out the window, to the darkening late autumn sky. Sitting where he is, at the desk in the headmaster’s office he can only see sky, and just barely the tops of the trees in the distance. He wonders often what part of the sky Harry, Ron and Hermione are seeing. He glances at Ginny next to him, sitting with her pale freckled hands in her lap and her back straight, staring resolutely at the door where Snape will enter. He feels sorry for her, but knows if he told her that she’d strangle him. If he feels abandoned he can’t even imagine how she feels.

He startles when Snape finally flings the door open, sits up as straight as he can. In his first years at Hogwarts he’d always shied away when Snape was in the room, tried to be as small as possible, unnoticeable, but now he seems to instinctively want to do the exact opposite. He is afraid but sees it, him, maybe more as a challenge and less as a threat. He’s grateful for that, that his brain has decided this for him. He’d be terrified otherwise, with the way Snape is looking at them. 

“Professor,” Ginny says as a greeting and Snape’s expression darkens.

“Headmaster,” he spits, already angry. 

Neville swallows. “Headmaster,” he says, hating himself for being so placating, such a softie. 

Snape is practically vibrating with suppressed anger. He sits down slowly at his desk, doesn’t even look at Neville, but keeps his black eyes on Ginny, who just stares back. 

“Do you have any idea how long it has taken the house elves to clean up your mess? How many teachers had to take hours out of their schedule today to fix your mistake?”

Ginny glares, presses her lips together, but Neville lights up at the word mistake. If Snape is willing to write this off as a mistake, they’ll be fine. They can’t know they did it on purpose. 

“I hope you’re aware someone could have gotten hurt?” Snape enunciates coldly and slowly, leaning on the desk.

“Definitely, sir,” Neville says, and Snape looks at him for the first time since he’s entered the room. “We apologize.”

“Oh?” Snape asks, eyes back to Ginny now, who looks like she’s trying to set his hair on fire with a silent charm. “Ms Weasley, do you apologize?”

She’s quiet and Neville nudges her. Please, he thinks. She has to understand that he’s not afraid. Not for himself. He’s worried Snape will leave it to the Carrows, and that they will punish the others. It was their plan, if anyone’s going to be punished it should be them.

“No, sir,” she says and Snape clenches his hands.

“Ginny, come on,” Neville whispers, and he can hear how almost frantic he sounds. 

Ginny finally stops glaring at Snape and looks over to Neville, just quickly. “Stop it,” she hisses, and then turns to Snape. “I won’t apologize for something I did on purpose.”

Snape leans back in his chair, looks like he wants to shout at them but for some reason won’t. 

“I planned it, sir. I designed the hex and I executed it. No one else knew about it,” Ginny says, slowly, as if she expects herself to change her mind any minute.

He understands what she’s doing. She’s taking the blame. Suddenly Neville is angry. She has no right to do this, this wasn’t what they talked about. Snape looks as sceptical as Neville feels. 

“Oh, so Mr Longbottom here just happened to stroll in while you were casting a flooding spell over the entire third floor? That little ragtag group of Gryffindors always following the two of you around just happened to be standing in the hallway at the same time?”

“I never told them the extent of what I was planning,” Ginny says evenly. The hands in her lap are still.

“Do not insult me with this.” Snape is also still, frighteningly so. Then he says, “Leave.”

Ginny moves, stops being a very stubborn statue and leans forward. “What?” she says, not angrily but just pure confusion. 

“You’re lying. 50 points from Gryffindor. And I want you to leave.”

Ginny frowns, shakes her head. “But-“

“Leave!” Snape says, standing up. 

Ginny starts to her feet, pushing her chair back in the progress. She opens her mouth but says nothing and then looks down at Neville. Snape is still not shouting, and it’s worrying. 

“No, just you. Longbottom stays,” Snape says, like he’s trying to be reasonable, like this is normal. Neville’s head is screaming at him. He can do this. He’s not scared. He is scared. 

“Why?” Ginny asks, hesitating. 

“That does not seem to be any of your concern, Weasley,” Snape says, and Ginny has no choice. To her credit, she looks absolutely distraught when she throws one last glance at him before turning to the door. Neville’s sitting with his back to the door so he can only hear the muted click when it shuts. 

They’re alone now, and Snape sits down again. And then just sits, silent. Neville shifts in his seat, looks from Snape’s face to his desk back to his face. He doesn’t have to speak. This is good. If he’s not going to ask any questions Neville won’t say anything.

“50 points from Gryffindor and detention for two months,” Snape says finally, so quietly that Neville doesn’t even hear it at first and stares at him for too long. 

He opens his mouth, feels stupid, closes it again. “Thank you,” he says, insanely enough, and then when Snape just sits there again, he says. “So I can, um, leave?”

“Seven o’clock tomorrow,” Snape says, starts picking at the papers on his desk. “Yes, you can leave.”

“Tomorrow’s Saturday.”

“Oh, are the consequences of your actions inconvenient for you?”

Neville swallows his response. “I’ll see you tomorrow, sir.”

\--

It’s a bad solution. The Carrow siblings won’t stop badgering him about how “lenient” he is with the students, the rest of the faculty seem either angry or scared, Minerva won’t talk to him at all. Letting them off this easily is not a good solution, but it will at least stop them from being harmed, he tells himself. In the short run, at least. His eyes sweep over the empty walls once full of portraits of former headmasters. He wonders if his own portrait will hang there some time, after the war. Maybe. Probably not. He’d taken them down reluctantly, at Dumbledore’s suggestion. His portrait’s suggestion. He keeps it now stuffed in the back of his closet, takes it out only once a week, discussing strategy. It takes him two generous glasses of whiskey to stomach opening the door. Alcohol seems to be a weakness he’s acquired in later years. 

He’d chosen the Longbottom boy only because he cannot stomach that little redhead’s constant glaring. Longbottom can be reasoned with. Longbottom is scared of him. He can handle that. It’s somehow easier than the anger. He’s dealt enough with anger. 

Maybe she’ll take it as a personal affront, up the stakes, cause more trouble. Severus rubs the bridge of his nose, grabs the bottle of painkilling potion he keeps in his desk drawer, opens it and swallows a mouthful. He sits in the grim half dark of his office and waits for the headache to ebb into background noise.

When Longbottom shows up Saturday night he puts him to use sorting mail. It’s unbelievable how much of Severus’ time is spent reading mail, writing terse replies to parents complaining. They want their children to be safe, he understands, but why can’t they understand there is nothing he can do. He sits at his desk and reads the latest slew of notes from the teachers, reports and suggestions. 

Rolanda wants new broomsticks for the teams, she’s written in a short note on the back of what seems to be a package wrapping. Minerva writes informing him of a fight she intercepted between two Gryffindors. It’s really a disciplinary question to be handled by the Carrows, but Minerva’s too clever to let them handle it. He writes a short reply he knows she won’t respond to, telling her to deal with it as she pleases. No one seems willing to come see him in his office. Not even that griping idiot Horace Slughorn seems particularly comfortable when he deems to see him. He wants to be friends, he says, brings Severus bottles of exotic liquor, jokes. Of course he does, always the turncoat, always kissing the ass with the most power. Severus shakes his head, he shouldn’t judge. It’s the smart thing to do.

“Sir,” Longbottom pipes up from the other end of the room. He’d forgotten he was there until he spoke and glances at the clock on his desk. It’s well past nine and the boy hasn’t spoken up until now. Severus wants to slap him. He has that gut reaction more often than he’d like to admit. He strikes it down to how utterly weak the boy seems. It’s a terrible quality.

“What?” The word comes out more forceful than he would have wanted.

“I, um, how long do you want me to stay?” he asks. 

“Are you finished?” 

He has given him all the mail he has received the entire semester. He knows the boy can’t possibly be done. 

“Um, no, sir, but it’s past curfew and-“

“You can go,” Severus interrupts, and the boy nods, mumbles something. 

He watches him as he gathers up his things, pushes in the chair. He moves with the sort of languid carelessness only found in teenage boys. That feeling deep in his gut might be envy, or disgust. Teenage boys are ruthless, teenage boys are vicious. Teenage boys are, in their own minds, the rulers of the fucking earth. 

“You can leave if you tell me if Ms Weasley was telling the truth,” Severus says slowly, and Longbottom stops, turns to him. 

They both know it’s a pointless question. She wasn’t. They both know. This is such an obvious provocation that Severus almost expects him to leave without answering. He doesn’t, of course.

“I-“ 

“It’s a yes or no question, Longbottom.”

And Longbottom is calm. Instead of anger, instead of fear even, there’s just nothing. This is even more aggravating than the weakness. This is, if anything, a provocation. 

“Come here,” he says, sharply, stepping around the desk so that they are standing just a few metres from each other, Severus on the elevated section where his desk stands. He wants to feel like he’s towering over him, but Longbottom is about his height now, so he barely has to look up to speak.

“I’m sorry,” Longbottom says evenly, and Severus’s face forms into an involuntary sneer.

“Are you not going to answer me?” Severus says, feels the weakness in the statement. Why is this bothering him so much? 

“I’m sorry, I-“ Longbottom starts, his eyes on the floor.

“Look at me,” Severus says and as the light eyes meet his own he can’t help it. He slips right in, the boy has no defences. It’s like sliding into warm water. He sees himself, tall, dark, intimidating, stalking through a classroom. He sees the Weasley girl lying on the grass, talking animatedly, her hands making intricate shapes. He sees Longbottom helping that strange blonde Ravenclaw girl carry her bags onto the train, they’re on their way to Hogwarts, Longbottom is happy and worried all at the same time, emotions swirling. He sees Longbottom and his grandmother, walking up the steps to St Mungo’s, Longbottom smaller than he is now, twelve maybe, holding his grandmothers hand and – 

“Stop it!” Longbottom shouts. He has pushed Severus into his desk, broken eye contact. “What are you doing?” he asks, finally angry, outraged even. Severus’ hip aches, pressed into the edge of the desk. He pushes away from it.

“If you won’t tell me the truth-“ Severus starts and Longbottom steps closer.

“You have no right to do that!” he shouts, fists clenching, breathing heavily. 

“Of course I have a right, when my students won’t tell me the truth-“

“You know the truth,” he practically growls. “You know she didn’t do it herself. What is this, are you bored? Are you that small of a man that you have to-“

Severus slaps him, backhands him across his right cheek. Longbottom’s head jerks to the side and he quiets. He rubs his face, as if he can’t imagine where the pain came from. Severus can feel himself deflate. He should apologize. He should. But the silence just stretches on, fills the room, suffocating. 

“Do it again,” Longbottom says.

\--

His cheek aches. He shouldn’t have said that, but at this point he doesn’t care. He’s so angry. He managed to keep it under check as he sat there, sorting letter after letter, Snape not even looking at him. Then this. Now, when it’s over, he knows it was Legilimency. He has no right to do that. 

“Do it again,” he repeats. Snape looks almost scared. He’s making no attempt to move, just looks at Neville with an empty stare. 

“Do it again. Do you feel strong hitting me?” Neville spits out. He doesn’t think he’s ever been this angry before, but there’s something else too. He wants to feel it again, the pain, wants to control it like he did last time. This isn’t like Amycus Carrow driving his wand into his shoulder blades while whispering about his parents, this isn’t sitting scared in a school bench while his sister rants about muggles with a crazy glint in her eye. A choice. He’s in control here, he can take it. “Do it again you fucking coward.”

When Snape hits him again it’s harder. When he touches his tongue to his lip he tastes blood, salty and metal. He gingerly touches his fingers to it and then looks at the red on his fingers. When he looks up Snape is staring at him, eyes dark. He looks… Neville doesn’t even know. He’s never seen anyone look like that before, he’s never been stared at like this. Then he moves, smoothly, like a there is a current through his body, steering him. It’s the best he’s ever looked. It’s frightening, but mostly exciting.

Snape is close now and Neville only has to whisper for him to hear. “Again.”

Instead of hitting, Snape brings his hand up and grabs the back of Neville’s neck, tightly. He can feel his nails digging into the soft skin where his spine connects to his skull. He’s so close that he can smell him. He’s holding his breath. 

Then he lets go. 

“Leave.”


	2. Chapter Two

Severus sits behind his desk and waits. Stares at the door. Outside his window it starts snowing. It’s only late October, but the chill seems fitting.

It’s almost 8 o’clock, Sunday evening. He’s going to be here any minute. 

Severus is an idiot. A disgusting old man. He could have made an excuse, he could have delegated the detention to Minerva. He could just not open the door. 

But he sits there and thinks about the line of Longbottom’s throat when his head snapped back, the tenseness around his mouth, his fingers as he pulled them out of his mouth, red and wet. And when Longbottom knocks, he opens the door.

He lets him continue sorting mail. Watching him this time, as he fiddles with his coffee mug with one hand and flits through the papers in front of him with the other. Tedious scheduling issues, people booking classrooms at the same time, everyday problems. He looks over once in a while, at the sand coloured hair, a bit too long, falling across his temples. He lets his eyes roam over the rolled-up sleeves, the light hair dusting across his arms. Is the rest of his hair the same colour, he wonders. He moves his eyes back to the page he had been reading when the boy stands up suddenly, looks over at him. 

“I’m finished,” he says, walking over and placing a bundle of papers on the desk carefully. “These are the ones I didn’t know how to, um, sort.”

Severus says nothing. He wants to grab him, wants to drag his nails over that pale skin, wants to slap him again, wants wants wants. He must be going crazy. The boy isn’t pretty, isn’t attractive, isn’t clever or talented. He’s brash and weak, awkward and too unused to his own body, too young. Young and soft and pliable. He wants to see his skin red and bruised and cracked open. 

“Yesterday,” Longbottom starts and then goes quiet. Severus wants him to ask for it again. Is he here to ask Severus to forget it, never mention it again? “I-I,” the boy starts, chewing on his lip, where the impact of Severus’ hand had split it open. 4

“What do you want?” Severus asks, and even to himself he sounds hungry, desperate.

Longbottom doesn’t answer, stands stiffly at the other end of the desk. He opens his mouth and closes it, then smiles awkwardly. Severus sees the appeal now. Smiling, he looks like the sun.

“Are you going to apologize for yesterday?” Severus asks, and the smile falters. 

“Um.”

He’s trying to be intimidating now, wants to see how far he’ll go, so he stalks forward, moves around the desk. He knows how to do this, it’s a familiar role. He revels in the feeling, like putting on an old pair of robes hung in the back of the closet for years and finding they fit perfectly, every line straight, every seam perfect.

“I… I don’t…” Longbottom says, and then, when they’re standing face to face, finishes with a quiet, “Oh.”

“Are you going to apologize?” he asks again, one hand on the desk. 

“Yes. Yes, sir. I’m sorry,” he says nodding quickly, mouth slack. 

“Do you think that’s good enough?” Severus asks, circling. He’s an animal, he’s a predator, he is wearing robes so perfectly stitched he doesn’t even realise they are there. 

\--

Snape is behind him, one hand on his neck, on his hairline, and he’s never been so nervous. He can’t seem to control his breathing, but somehow that’s okay. Some part of him hates himself for being so easily intimidated, for being so easily impressed. 

“Lean forward,” Snape says, so close to his ear that he can feel each puff of air as he speaks. He hesitates and the hand on his neck presses down ever so slightly. “Over the desk,” Snape continues and Neville shivers.

He does as he’s told. With his forehead pressed against the cool wood, and his hands splayed out next to his head he feels exposed, naked almost. Oh god, what if Snape wants him to pull his pants down? Then Snape grabs his hips, and the fear spikes up even more. “Legs wider,” he says, large hands with thin fingers shuffling his body into place. Then they stay there, lie heavy against the side of Neville’s body. He waits, tries to calm his breathing. 

“I want you to apologize, each slap,” he says, finally moving his hands. They leave him cold and needy. His head feels empty and full at the same time, buzzing with white noise. 

Then he slaps him, a red-hot pain across the soft flesh of his ass. “I’m sorry!” Neville almost shouts, the words almost pulled out of him by the hit. He feels as if his entire body moves with it, like the force travels up his torso and through the entirety of him, but that can’t possibly be true. 

“Is that how you speak to your betters?” Snape says, and he sounds out of breath. Neville wishes he could see him. 

He scrambles for what Snape wants him to say. “Um, I’m sorry, sir?” he tries, after a few seconds and Snape brings his hand down again, softly this time, to follow the curve of his ass. It feels good, like a reward. Neville wants to feel this way always. 

“Good,” he says and then, “Are you ready?” 

He doesn’t know but it doesn’t seem to matter, because Snape does it again without waiting for an answer, on the other cheek this time. “I’m sorry, sir,” Neville says, proud of how level his voice sounds this time. He hits him again, quickly, and waits for Neville to repeat it before slapping him a fourth time. 

He groans this time, swears under his breath, before getting out a weak, “I’m sorry, sir.”

Snape lets him go again. “Excuse me? What did you say?”

“I’m sorry, sir.”

“No, no, what did you say?” Snape breathes out, grabbing a fistful of Neville’s hair. As he leans over him, Neville can smell his cologne, or after shave, or whatever else it is he uses to smell like that. He smells like a man. The fear returns as Snape yanks his head back by the hair and repeats, “What did you say?”

“Shit,” Neville admits, quietly.

He yanks again, making Neville have to arch his back. “Watch your language or I will shut that filthy mouth for you,” he hisses into his ear, and Neville feels like he’s melting. He feels empty, he feels so good. He stays quiet and when Snape releases him he slumps back over the desk again. His scalp is burning. “Again, apologize.”

He slaps him again and Neville gets out an, “I’m sorry, sir,” fast and clean this time, and earns another stroke. He keeps this up until the strokes no longer are a reward, until it hurts even when he just graces him. He doesn’t know how many slaps they are at now, he’s lost count. He answers the slaps now only out of instinct which seems to be the only thing left inside him. 

Snape is breathing hard now, his hands on Neville shaking. “Get up,” he says now, softly. Neville can’t move, feels like his legs will give in under him if he tries to shift his weight from the comforting wood of the desk. Snape eases him up anyway, and Neville finds that he can stand, although shakily. Snape is asking him something, and when he doesn’t respond, he can feel Snape’s warm fingers across his cheek, guiding him to look at him.

“I’m good,” Neville gets out. “I’m good.”

\--

Severus sits in his quiet office, alone again, and slides his fingers over the wet spot on his papers, left after Longbottom’s slack, open mouth pressing against it. His hand stings. 

He shouldn’t have been so forceful with him, he understands that, but seeing the boy stretched out like that he can’t blame himself. He thinks about the little noises and gasps he’d let out and can’t feel any shame. The boy leaning over the desk, nervously, his hands grasping at nothing when struck, clenching when bracing himself. 

That lovely soft bounce, that lovely hard cracking noise, when he’d struck him. Merlin, he shouldn’t.

They hadn’t said a word to each other afterwards. He’d sat Longbottom down in the visitor’s chair, had watched him calm his breathing, get the focus back in his eyes, understand what they’d done, what’s been done to him. Alright, he does feel shame. It creeps into the edges of his thoughts now, dirties, darkens. He’s still hard. 

He shuffles the papers on his desk. This isn’t, of course, the first time he’s done this. He’s had partners before, he’s in his thirties, he knows what he likes. What he likes to do to people, what he likes to have done to him. This isn’t new. But there is the age, there is the lack of negotiation, there are the reasons. He imagines talking to Albus about it, or even worse somehow, Minerva. He imagines her disappointed, angry eyes glaring at him over the edge of her glasses. But she already does that, what is the difference. She already feels he is scum. He is scum. 

And he killed Albus, so that’s hardly a problem.

He looks over at the empty walls again, feels almost a twinge of longing, or want. But then again, he never had the face for portraits anyway. 

His thoughts turn back to Longbottom. Neville. He wants to say it out loud, test it out. He doesn’t, he’s not a teenager and this is too close to scribbling names in notebooks for his comfort. 

He wonders what the boy is doing now. He surely must have left a mark. Is he by himself now, touching those marks? Touching that reddened skin? It will surely bruise. Will it cause him discomfort days from now, make him shift in his school bench as he tries to concentrate ? 

Severus snaps out of it. He can’t do this. He’ll take a shower, jerk off, pretend this never happened. Yes. He cannot afford this, not now. Not with this much at stake. Albus gave him a job to do and he’ll do it. He’ll try his best to keep the students safe (not happy, there’s a difference), he’ll stay close to the Dark Lord, he’ll help Potter. The war will end. He won’t put Neville in danger like this. Longbottom. Dammit. 

\--

When Neville knocks on the door the next day no one opens. He stands in the hallway for 45 minutes until he leaves. When no one opens the next day, he stays only for 15. 

His behind isn’t killing him like he thought it would when he walked back to the dorm, there’s only a dull ache. It looks worse than it is. Late at night, he locks the door to the bathroom he now only shares with Seamus, and inspects himself in the full length mirror while the water in the shower runs, stares and prods until the mirror is completely fogged up. The skin isn’t broken, but it’s red and irritated and he’s sure it will bruise. There is a strange feeling, like his body isn’t his own. Or no, not like that. But that he has shared something of his body with someone else. 

This feels more like that than the few times he has had sex, strangely enough. Calling it having sex though, seems almost too generous. A thing with his muggle neighbour one summer, fooling around by the Great Lake with some other sixth year. Never in the light, never sober. Even stranger, when he thinks about it, is the recognition that what he did with Snape is sexual. Kissing Snape seems strange, touching him with that intent even stranger. The uncertainty of it somehow makes it even hotter.

He’s not proud, but after inspecting the damage in the mirror, he jerks off slowly and thoroughly in the shower, coming quietly, biting into the soft flesh of his hand until it hurts. And then, to his surprise, he cries.

If he were to explain it, he’d say it’s because his life now, at this point, seems to be only confusion and disappointment. Harry’s left him, Ron’s left him. Dean at least writes letters, that Seamus read aloud in the night sometimes, when neither of them can sleep. He’s sure Ginny will leave too. She keeps asking him to take more responsibility with the DA, keeps being hard on him. She suspects her mother won’t let her come back if she goes home for Christmas break. And how will he do that? How will he lead the DA when she’s not there? How is he going to keep anyone safe? 

And now there’s also the mixture of how good it felt and what that could possibly say about him, and the fact that Snape doesn’t seem to want to do it again. Is Neville supposed to just walk around now, with these marks, these reminders? Snape can’t do this. He can’t do that and then stop. 

But that’s what he does. He goes to class, eats, sleeps, until the redness has faded. He doesn’t see Snape other than maybe twice at dinner, where he only barely glances to the students, and certainly not to Neville. Neville doesn’t tell anyone, doesn’t see the point. He feels ashamed maybe. Either way, he doesn’t think people would get it. Luna maybe, but then he can’t see himself having that discussion with her. He’s never heard her interested in sex, doesn’t think she works like that. Maybe he could explain it, but what if she looks at him differently? 

This is a bad man. Maybe he should focus on that. Snape is a bad man. Snape has killed people. He believes what he’s heard from Harry of that night when Dumbledore died. He faced him, said the killing curse, actually uttered the words. And then those lips had breathed filthy into Neville’s ear, those hands had pushed him forward and spanked him. Spanked him. Neville can’t even think it without blushing.

It’s the middle of November, and nothing goes right. Dean stops sending letters. Neville wakes up several nights in a row and glances over at Seamus’ empty bed, finds him sitting quietly in the common room and staring into the fire, not crying. Alecto Carrow shoves one of the third years into a desk, cracks two ribs and then forces the girl to sit through 45 minutes of class before going to the infirmary. Luna burns a strip up her whole left arm attempting a fire charm in a DA meeting and the room won’t stop smelling of burnt skin. 

And so when Neville knocks on Snape’s door this evening, he’s angry. Angry at this bad man and the things he won’t do to help. There’s no answer, and Neville knocks again. And then again, angrily, pounding now. 

Snape almost throws the door open, so abrupt that Neville, in the middle of a knock, almost falls face first into him. 

“Longbottom. What do you want?” Snape asks, not at all meaning what he did the last time Neville heard him say those exact words.

“I want to come in,” Neville says, almost spits.

“Make an appointment,” Snape says, quietly.

“I need to come in,” Neville says, taking a step forward. 

“What could possibly have given you the idea that speaking to me like that is acceptable?” Snape is still not letting him into the room. “I am your headmaster.”

“Doing a great job,” Neville says, and at that Snape backs away, into the room. Not on purpose, it seems like, but Neville pushes past him anyway. When he’s well into the office, he turns around, watches Snape shut and lock the heavy wooden door. 

“Are you here to leave a review of my work so far?” Snape spits with contempt, not looking at him. 

Why is Neville there?

“Zero out of ten,” he says mockingly, throwing out his hands in frustration. 

“Write me a fucking note about it,” Snape says then, quiet and seething. 

Neville has no response. He’s never heard Snape use a word like that, never heard any of the teachers talk like that. It’s shocking. It’s exciting. He stays quiet for an embarrassing amount of time, knows how wide-eyed he must look. He shuffles his feet on the thick carpet, tramples back and forth nervously, angrily. Maybe he should have planned this visit out. Although some things you can’t think too hard on before doing.

“No, I’m here now,” Neville exclaims. “Since you asked, I can give you a summary.”

Snape makes a face, takes a few hard steps forward. Neville tells himself not to move, not to back away. He has to do this.

“How does it feel to be possibly the most hated headmaster in Hogwarts’ history?” Neville starts, almost laughing now. He can feel his pulse pounding in his head.

“Hm, yes, popularity was the goal when I took this job.” Snape’s voice is still quiet, still trying to be dismissive. He could have kicked him out already. Could have used magic. They both know this. This is a choice. 

“What was the goal then? Slowly kill all your students? Glad to report you’re getting there!”

“They are all alive.”

“Now, yeah. The ones that are still here. The ones who haven’t left because of those psychos in charge of ‘discipline’,” Neville gestures into the air, to the feeling of dread smothering him every day. It’s here as well, here inside the walls of Snape’s office, inside his lungs, always.

“That wasn’t my decision,” Snape says, louder now. 

“Oh, did you fight it? Did you stand up for the wellbeing of your students? Sure.” Neville is almost screaming now. It feels good, this anger filling him up. 

“You have no idea what this job entails, what I do every day, what I did to get it-“

“Well, can’t be too hard a job to land. Just murder the guy who had it before you, I guess.” 

Snape grabs the front of his shirt roughly, slams him into the bookcase behind him. 

“Do not talk of things you don’t understand, you fucking child,” he gets out through gritted teeth. The books behind his head shake, either from the force that Snape used to slam him into it, or the agitated magic crackling in the air. When Neville doesn’t say anything, he leans into him with his whole body, tightens the fist in his shirt. His jaw is tense, his eyes black and crazy. Then he lets him go, abruptly, and Neville has to grab onto the shelves to keep from falling. “Lean on the desk.”

His stomach does a flip. “Fuck you,” he says. 

“Lean on the desk,” he repeats, putting force into every word. When Neville still doesn’t move, he grabs his hair, flings him toward the centre of the room. Neville manages to stay on his feet, stumbles into the side of the desk. “You will be sorry you said that.”

Neville leans, slowly. 

“No.” Snape is behind him, Neville can hear the soft noise of his footsteps as he stalks from one side to the other, and then he’s suddenly there. He tugs at his pants. “Take them off.”

Neville’s heart is racing. He stands hunched over and with sweaty fingers unbuttons his pants, pulls them down just slightly. He looks over his shoulder and meets Snape’s eyes. Dark still, crazy still. 

“All the way.”

Neville does as he’s told, faces forward again and lets the fabric go and it catches by his knees, which seems good enough for Snape. He blushes. 

\--

He’s being so good Severus wants to scream. He has him bent over his desk again, this time all that smooth pale skin laid out all for him. He runs a hand down his back, slides a thumb down below the line of his dark blue underwear. He can practically feel him shiver under his hands. He wonders if he’ll let him take them off. Wonders if he should ask or just do it. 

He grabs at the edge with careful fingers, slides them down one centimetre, two. Longbottom clenches his fists, but doesn’t say anything. He uses both hands then, pushes them down to just below his ass, where his thighs start. Lovely.

Severus would call his ass plump, not so large that it doesn’t fit his frame, but not so scrawny that there’s nothing there. He squeezes and Longbottom makes the tiniest choked noise. He wonders if he’d turn him around now, if he’d be hard. Dripping, pushing up against him, begging. He wonders if he’d let him slide his fingers into him, if he’d clench down on them and moan. He bets he’d be wordy. Oh, he wants to make him beg.

He pulls his hand back, strikes once, twice, before he remembers he should make him count. It’s more fun that way, hearing him falter a bit more each time he tries to talk, stutter. He should make sure he stays responsive, too.

“Stay still,” he says, rounds the desk, picks up his wand, conjures a plain wooden paddle. “Do you know what this is?” Snape asks him when he sees he glances over. What a sight he is. 

He shakes his head and Snape holds it out. “Touch it. You can move.”

He hesitantly reaches out, takes a hold of the handle, runs his fingers over it, then hands it back. 

“I’m going to hit you with it and you’re going to count,” Severus says.

Longbottom nods, leans his forehead on the table. 

He steadies him with one hand on his back, lift his arm and smacks down, gently first. The sound it makes is louder than with his hand alone, a harder and more naked crack.

“One,” Longbottom says, almost immediately. There’s no fear in his voice, only eagerness and comfort. Severus wonders how much of that is wishful thinking on his part. 

He strikes again, harder this time, and it takes Longbottom by surprise.

“Hnn, two,” he breathes, leans his head to the side. 

“How many do you want? How many do you think you deserve?” Snape asks, not expecting an answer. “Fifteen? Twenty?” 

He strikes again. Crack.

“Three.”

“Using that language,” Snape continues, can hear how his voice is flustered, eager. 

“Four!”

“Barging into my office, provoking me.”

“Five.”

“You wanted this, didn’t you, you enjoy this,” he says, strikes twice in rapid succession, doesn’t wait for Longbottom to count. 

“Six, seven,” he hurries, sounds like he might cry.

He has been staying remarkably still so far, but now he wiggles, probably involuntarily. He keeps his hands by his head though, doesn’t try to get up. Severus hasn’t even told him to do that, he just did. A natural. God.

“You filthy creature,” Snape huffs, strikes again.

“Nine, no eight, sorry. I’m so sorry.”

He hits again and Longbottom squeaks, pulls away. The skin is red now, irritated. He will have trouble sitting down tomorrow, Severus thinks, and only now really feels how hard he is. His head is swimming, his pants are tight.

“Nine,” Longbottom gets out, and yes, he’s crying. Severus pauses, leans back and palms at himself through his pants, feels like a teenager. 

“You’re so pretty,” he sighs, before he can stop himself. Like this, he really is. Red and swollen and sweating. “You’re so good.”

Longbottom says nothing, Severus doesn’t even know if he hears him. He strikes again.

“Ah, ah,” Longbottom snivels. “Ten.”

Severus pauses, watches the way his whole body seems to move as he breathes, heaves.

“Please,” Longbottom mumbles, perhaps not even aware he’s talking. “Please, I can’t, please.”

“You can, just two more, can you do that?” Severus almost rushes to comfort him, strokes down his side with one hand. “Can you do that?” he repeats.

“Please. Yes. Yes.”

He hits again, before Longbottom has even closed his mouth, and gets a pained yelp in return, but then, clear and loud, “Eleven.” 

And then with as much force as he can muster, he hits again. 

“Twelve!” the boy shouts, the tension in his body coming to some sort of climax. He sobs, unashamed, shaking.

Severus can’t stop his hands from touching him now, doesn’t want to. “You were so good. Stand up.”

The boy does, turns around clumsily. His face is as red as his ass, his eyes wet and mouth open. His shirt goes to mid-thigh, but Severus can still see, from how the fabric bends, that he is half-hard. He is beautiful. 

He puts his one hand on the boy’s hip, the other on his cheek, wants to grab and grab.

“Are you alright?”

It takes him a few moments to respond, to swallow down the spit in his mouth it seems. His tongue swivels lazily over his lower lip. “I’m good,” he says quietly. “I feel empty. It’s good.”

Severus wants to laugh, wants to swallow him whole.

“I’m going to give you something for the pain,” he says, but doesn’t move away. He performs a silent Accio and the lower drawer in his desk flies open, and the vial is in his hand. “It’s a lotion, put it on before you go to bed tonight.”

“Can you do it?” he asks, large eyes looking from the vial and back to Severus’ face. “Please.”

He doesn’t say anything, afraid that if he opens his mouth he will let something undignified spill out, let everything undignified spill out. Longbottom turns around again, almost tripping over his pants. He leans forward again, hands on the desk.

The boy did ask. He did ask, he wants him to. Shit. 

He wants to take him to bed, wants to lie him down, spread him open, touch all that soft skin. Instead he spreads the lotion on his hands, carefully touches them to the bruised skin. Longbottom gasps, pants. He works until Longbottom is shiny and oily almost half-way down his thighs, until the pained gasps turn into soft moans, and then just silence. Is he dreaming this?

He spreads his hand out and it glides easily. He could let his escalate. It would be easy. He could press one finger against tight muscle and be inside him. Oh God, he could fuck him.

“Th- thank you,” Longbottom says now. Severus realises his hands have stopped moving, pulls them back. And then, as a gift, Longbottom continues, “Thank you, sir.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> His head is swimming, his pants are tight. mom's spaghetti
> 
> well here we are again. let me know if you think i need to tag anything else!


	3. Chapter Three

When he gets back to his dorm he’s smiling. His face feels tight. He feels sore, and not just in the, well, expected places. When he throws himself down onto his bed, he feels like he’s run a marathon, his muscles ache in a familiar, comfortable way. 

He lies still on top of the covers, hears Seamus come in and start to get into bed. They didn’t do anything. Well. He knows they were close to doing something… bigger. He wanted him to. He knows Snape wanted to as well, could somehow feel it in the way he touched him, the way he kept himself from touching him. 

He knows they were close. But then it was as if he’d flipped a switch and then suddenly Snape was moving away, helping him put his clothes back on, telling him to leave. And then he was outside of his office, still warm and gently bruised and smiling. 

It feels so easy. Neville can understand, would even expect, that something like this would feel… difficult? Confusing? But there is something clear and precise about the anger he feels towards Snape. And the calm he feels now. It’s just easy. 

This other feeling is confusing. This other mixture of want and shame and pleasure. But he doesn’t have to think about it, just has to act on it. Just has to go to back. 

He goes to class, he goes to the DA meeting they have in a rush after dinner. Ginny wants them to perfect the spells they learned yesterday. Like this, she is ruthless. Where Harry had been careful and hesitant she is strong and authoritative. Neville respects that more, and he can tell the few second and first years who have joined do too. Harry didn’t need to make people respect him, Neville supposes, it came with the name. 

When it’s almost nine he taps her on the shoulder and tells her he has to leave. As she turns from the boy she’s gently giving instructions to, she looks confused and annoyed. 

“What’s more important than this?” she asks, pushes her hair out of her face. She adds absentmindedly, to lighten the mood, “You got a date?”

Neville shrugs, “I’ve got detention.”

Now she seems even more confused, does a shake with her head that shakes the hair down into her face again. “What? I thought that was over, I thought you said he ran out of work for you or whatever.”

He shrugs again. “Yeah, I thought so too. Must have changed his mind.”

“Well, what a bastard,” Ginny says, lets her eyes sweep over the room. “It’s okay. We’re just doing repetitions tonight anyway, I can handle it.”

He pats her on the arm. “Yeah, I know you can,” he says and then adds, “Don’t keep them too long, they do need that whole sleep thing.”

Ginny grins. “Hard work equals better sleep.”

He catches himself trying to fiddle his hair into something prettier on the way to Snape’s office, then lets his hand drop to his side. He doesn’t have to do that, it’s the beauty of it. He doesn’t have to be nervous about this. Snape opens the door after just one knock this time.

“Sir,” Neville says, and Snape steps aside to let him in after just a quick glance at him. He locks the door behind him. 

And then they stand there. Snape stalks off, not back to behind his desk, but to sit in the armchair at the other end of the room. He leans back, turns his eyes to Neville again. 

“Sit down,” he says and Neville does. He sits stiffly in the sofa across from Snape, the fireplace to his right crackling. The sofa is almost too comfortable, and Neville wonders why it’s even there. Does Snape lie down in it after working? Between meetings? Does he have guests that sit across from him, like Neville is now?

They’re quiet. Snape drags a hand across his mouth, brings it down again to lie against the dark leather of the armrest. 

“It is important that we talk,” Snape says, slowly and carefully. He is looking at him intently, seriously. Neville wants to laugh just to make him angry. 

“Yeah, okay,” Neville says instead, stays serious. 

“Do you agree?” Snape says, not a muscle moving in his face, but his fingers rising only slightly.

“Um, sure,” Neville nods, a bit confused.

“I want-“ Snape starts and then stops, leans forward just the smallest bit. “What do you want?”

That question again. Neville wants that easy feeling. The problem is maybe, this doesn’t feel as easy. Talking about it. 

Is this some sort of guilt thing? Snape wants him to ask for it, so he won’t feel guilty? Neville guesses that’s good? But why should he ease this man’s discomfort? Snape has decided to do this, it’s not Neville’s job to make him feel better. He’s agitated now, almost angry. If Snape feels this bad about it, why is he doing it?

“Do you… I don’t really know what to say?” Neville can hear the confusion in his own voice. He’s mumbling, to his own irritation. “What do you want me to say here?” he continues, faster now, but clearer.

Snape isn’t so calm anymore. Yes. Good. 

“I want to know I’m not… hurting you.”

“Hurting me seems to be the point, doesn’t it?” 

Snape makes a noise, something Neville would describe like a sharp annoyed inhale. “Stop it.”

“Stop what?” 

“You are infuriating. On purpose. I’m trying to-“ he stops talking abruptly, looking away.

“What’s the point of asking me that? If I wanted to leave I would have. And otherwise, if you think I’m staying because I feel pressured, it’s not like I’d say I want to leave now.” Neville does laugh.

“What am I supposed to do? Give you Veritaserum? Drug you? That would certainly make the situation better,” Snape spits. 

Neville smiles, says after a moment, “Why not?”

At this, Snape stands up. “Stop it,” he says again.

Neville stands up along with him. He laughs, once again, feels cruel. Good. “Really though. Why don’t you just give me some Veritaserum? If you want me to talk to you.”

Cruel, cruel. 

Snape sneers at him, says quietly, “There is never any guarantee someone will tell the truth, not with Veritaserum either. There are ways to get around it.”

It’s surprising he’s taking this so seriously now. It’s not until Neville takes a second to breathe that he realises how excited he is, how he’s almost out of breath.

“What ways?” Neville asks. “I don’t know how to do that.”

Snape seems at a loss for words, standing with his face half turned away, his hands on the back of his chair. Was Neville ever afraid of him? Is he afraid of him now?

“It could be fun,” Neville says. “We could both take it.”

Snape looks back at him, stays quiet for a long time. Neville can’t remember if he’s ever seen eyes that dark. Probably. He knows it’s the situation. Or the person. Whatever.

“Fine,” he says, finally. He stands up straight, stiffly, then moves slowly into one of the adjoining rooms. Neville’s never been in the headmaster’s office, and wonders what it looked like when Dumbledore used it. He sits down in the sofa again, when he realises: What if he asks him about the DA? He’s so goddamn stupid. What if Snape decides to ask him about things he’s not supposed to know, and bursts this bubble they have. 

It doesn’t feel like he will. The possibility only seems exciting. Shit.

When Snape comes back into the room, Neville is leaning forward onto his knees. 

“Are you sure?” he asks. In his left hand there is a small vial, and in his right is a larger bottle. 

Neville nods and as Snape sits down in the chair again, he conjures two glasses. 

“We have to have rules,” he says, and Snape nods. 

“Sure.”

“You can’t use Occlumency, that would be unfair,” Neville says.

Snape smiles. “You won’t possibly be able to know whether I comply or not.”

“No, I guess I’ll have to trust you,” Neville says, looking into those dark dark eyes. This is such an incredibly dumb idea. “And you can’t ask me about the school. I mean, about whether I… About the war, or whatever.”

“Sounds fair,” Snape says. He leans forward to pour from the larger bottle. Neville guesses it’s whiskey. He’s not really very good at alcohol, doesn’t really like the feeling of being drunk. He realises some people drink it because of the taste, but he hasn’t really ever understood that. Snape continues quietly, “Don’t ask me about the Dark Lord or what I do for him. Or any of my other duties.”

Neville is a little bit scared now. He doesn’t think Snape would hurt him, not seriously, but he knows he’s capable of hurting people. Just for a second, like an intense stab of pain, he thinks of his parents. No. 

“Yes, okay,” he says, scoots forward in the sofa, watches how Snape uncorks the vial, puts three drops in each glass. The Veritaserum is clear, looks like water. He raises the glass and smells it. There is just the sharp smell of alcohol, and when he looks up Snape is smirking. He must have winced at the smell.

“Should I drink all of it?” he asks.

“Yes. All of it,” Snape says, and then downs his drink. 

Neville does the same and now he’s definitely aware that he’s wincing. It tastes only of whiskey, and the aftertaste burns in his nostrils.

“How do you feel?” Snape asks, and then Neville can feel it. There is this incredible tug in his belly, at the core of him, when Snape asks. It doesn’t feel painful, or even bad, but he suspects it could after a longer period of time.

“Strange,” he says, and follows that up with a laugh. The tugging abates. “Is that what it feels like, the Veritaserum? That feeling in my stomach?”

“Not all kinds,” Snape says. “I made slight changes with this version. Stirring counter clockwise early in the brewing process and then switching to clockwise creates that heightened feeling of—” Snape is speaking efficiently but seems to have a hard time describing it accurately. He continues again,”—the desire to comply, to answer direct questions. Normally it only creates the inability to lie.”

Neville nods, wants to say something about potions, but he doesn’t really know anything about it. He hated the class, because of Snape himself. Not just because of him, not just because he frightened him but because of the accuracy it took. It’s the opposite of Herbology, where he can take his time, trust that he knows what to do, how to treat the plants, what would make them happy. Not that there aren’t instructions in Herbology, but they’re instructions that make sense to him. 

“I think we should take turns asking stuff. Like a game. You can go first if you want,” Neville says. It can’t possibly be because of the whiskey but he feels loose, relaxed. He leans back in the sofa.

“Yes,” Snape says, looks down at his hands. “How do you feel about being here tonight?”

The tug again. “Excited,” Neville says, he looks down at his hands, tries to sound calm. “It’s exciting.”

“How do you feel about being here with me? The things we… do. The things we did yesterday for example.”

Neville had expected him to focus less on feelings somehow. “I get very angry with you. Not in a bad way. It’s…” The feeling in his stomach changes as Neville speaks, coaxes him. “It calms me. A lot. It’s, um.” He suddenly can’t say anything, can’t get out what he wants to say. It must be the Veritaserum again. He starts over, tries to only say things he knows is true, to avoid that terrible resistance in his stomach, in his head. “I don’t know how to describe it,” he ends up saying. 

“Try,” Snape says and this time his he looks straight at him, eyes gleaming. 

“It’s hot,” Neville says, and he can feel a blush blooming across his face. He looks away. “It’s hot and it’s good when you make me have to think less. About everything.”

Snape is quiet until Neville looks back at him. “Are you afraid of me?”

“Isn’t it my turn to ask the questions soon?” Neville asks, sounding, to his horror, very nervous. 

“You should answer,” Snape says, and Neville knows he’s right.

“A little bit,” he says, laughs. “Not like I used to be.”

“Are you—“ Snape starts and at that Neville shakes his head. 

“No, it’s my turn now. One question at a time.”

“Fine,” Snape says. 

And now his head is spinning. He could ask anything. He could ignore the rules as much as Snape. He could ask him about Voldemort’s secrets, things that could help him, things that could help Harry. He thinks about the empty beds in the dorm, about being left, about Snape closing the door behind him because he couldn’t follow the rules.

“Is this sofa yours?” he asks, smiles. 

“What? Yes,” Snape says. 

“I mean, did you get it, or did someone else? Does it like, belong to the room or something?” 

“I got it. No, my parents bought it. I brought it from my house,” he says, slowly.

“Oh, do you—“ he starts but Snape interrupts him. 

“No, one question each.”

Neville shifts, “But you’ve asked like five questions.”

“Yes, but you changed the rules,” Snape leans forward to pour himself another drink, and then says, “Fine, you have two more questions.”

“Where do you live? When you’re not here.”

“Cokeworth,” Snape says. He looks disinterested. “Spinner’s End.”

“I don’t know where that is,” Neville says and Snape makes a move, like a small shrug. 

“It’s a nothing town,” he says, finally. “My turn?”

“No, that wasn’t a question. I have one left.”

Snape nods.

“What are your parents like?” he asks, and Snape looks sour.

“Dead,” he says, looks like he wants to end the conversation, looks down into his drink. “How is this relevant?”

“Sorry. I just wanted to know.”

“No more questions. My turn,” he says and is quiet for a moment, two moments. “Do you visit your parents?”

“Yes,” he says. Fuck him. Neville can’t ask what is parents are like but he can bring this up? “Are you trying to make some point here, or? If you don’t want me to ask about your parents you could just say so.”

Snape smiles and Neville boils. He looks down at his lap, has apparently clenched his hands into tight fists. When he relaxes his hands he can see the small half moons where his nails have dug into the skin. This is a disaster. The idea that the two of them could talk, that it would be exciting? What a load of shit. How did they agree to this? 

“Is your father a muggle?” Neville asks, and feels gleeful as Snape stops smiling. He’s heard the rumours, heard Harry and the others talk about it. Neville’s grown up surrounded by pureblood wizards and witches, he knows the hangups they have. His grandmother isn’t bigoted, but she is old, more and more often slips into saying questionable things. 

“Yes,” he says. “He was. Do you like living with your grandmother?”

“Not as much as I’d like my parents not being catatonic. What did your father do for a living?” 

“He worked in a factory. Do your parents recognize you when you visit?”

“No,” Neville says, intending to say something different, intending to say that he thinks so, he hopes so. The realisation that he knows they don’t, that hoping doesn’t make it true, that hoping doesn’t make him believe it, is crushing. That no matter how many candy wrappers he sneaks into his pocket it won’t change the fact that when he looks at his mother there is nothing there. The realisation is hard and cold. 

He’s not going to cry, he’s lived with this all his life, he’s had worse moments than this. Playmates looking dumbly at him when he says that no his mum and dad are just not here, where are they, well. Relatives implying that what his parents did was wrong, that this was somehow their fault, Neville thinking about cold Christmas mornings at the hospital and almost agreeing with them. That morbid curiousness he has seen in strangers. Oh, isn’t it awful, just terrible what happened to the Longbottoms. The things they say when they realise whose son Neville is. Living with his grandmother, making space for this nothing presence, having to walk around this strange nothingness that always anyways managed to be better than him. Someone being there and yet being nothing. No, he’s not going to cry, but when he looks up at Snape, the man looks away. Does he look that distraught? 

“I’m sorry,” Snape says. “That was unnecessary.”

He sounds calm, sounds professional. When Neville looks up from the floor there is more whiskey in his glass, and Snape is looking at him with apprehension.

“It’s… okay. You can ask about them,” Neville says, takes a sip from the glass and fights the disgust. “I love them a lot and it’s sad. Could be worse though.”

“An enviable point of view,” Snape says, quietly. 

“It doesn’t really mean anything. Things could always get worse,” Neville says. “My turn now, right?”

“If you want to.”

“Do you do this with any of the other students?” 

At this, Snape smiles again, and this looks honest. He looks younger when he smiles. It looks, unlike most of his expressions, unrehearsed. 

“Which part do you mean?” Snape says. 

“You know what I mean. The whole… This thing, the Veritaserum, the thing the other night?”

“No, I don’t. It’s just you.”

Neville feels warm, either from the whiskey or from something else. God. He’s blushing again. 

“Have you ever done this before?”

“Which part?” Neville mirrors, smiles.

Snape doesn’t answer. The Veritaserum tugs at him again, and he wonders if it does the same to Snape. Maybe not, they both know that wasn’t a serious question. 

“No,” Neville says, finally. He takes another sip from his glass, wonders if maybe he should just chug it. He feels a little buzz now, which still doesn’t make the drink taste better. “Next time you should give me something better to drink.”

Snape huffs. “Do you know how expensive this is?”

“No, and that doesn’t make it taste any better.”

“You don’t have to drink it,” Snape says. 

\--

He’s a little drunk, Severus thinks. He feels guilty for giving him a drink. He feels guilty at Longbottom being there in the first place. He knows he’s weak. But then again, what a useless thing to feel. Him feeling bad about it doesn’t make it undone. 

Longbottom’s face is red, a blush spreading down from his cheeks to his neck. He looks soft, round, almost happy. Severus wants to make him happy. 

“I wanted to talk to you about what you want us to do,” Severus says. Longbottom looks up at him. Sitting on the sofa, he’s slightly lower than Severus, and with some whiskey and Veritaserum he can admit that it feels good, having a height advantage. 

His eyes are green or blue, in this light it’s hard for Severus to tell. They look awake, intent. 

He smiles, looks away. Still that blush. Severus wonders if his skin is as warm as it looks. “I don’t really know? What can, um, I mean what are my options?”

“What did you like about earlier?”

The Veritaserum, this vial, should wear off soon. Severus wants permission, now, when he knows it’s not a lie. He needs to get this conversation back to where he wants it to be, not talking about things he needs to stop dwelling on.

“Um, I…” Longbottom trails off. 

Severus wants to tell him he won’t judge him, won’t have an opinion either way. That’s not true. Not true enough. “I’d be pleased if you told me, whatever you say.”

Longbottom still doesn’t say anything and Severus can see him squirm against the potion urging him to talk. This is almost better. 

“Did you like it when I hit you?” he asks, voice low. He worries he’s going to become aroused, have to hide an erection. He thinks that might scare him, he doesn’t want to do that at all. Not like that anyway, not right now.

“Yes,” Longbottom says, seems relieved.

They’ve abandoned the rules now, Severus doesn’t give him time to ask a question of his own. 

“Where?” he asks, then clarifies, “Where did you like me hitting you?”

“I liked it when you, when you used that thing,” Longbottom says, makes some sort of gesture with his hand. He’s still looking off somewhere, into his drink, down at the table between them. “I liked it when you grabbed my hair.”

“Yes,” he says. “Would you like to try it again? I can use other things.”

The look on his face isn’t one of fear, more shock. Severus thinks he might have ruined it for a few beats until Longbottom answers, and the mumbled words sound almost mesmerised. “Like what?”

“A cane or a crop. A whip,” he says, watches Longbottom intently. He still doesn’t seem scared, he seems curious, excited. “We could try all of it. If you want to.”

All of it. Such a big promise.

“Yeah,” he almost mumbles, his eyes wide. Blue, Severus thinks. 

“I could tie you up, if you’d like that.” He is hard now. Can Longbottom tell? He doesn’t think so. He seems busy mulling over what Severus has told him. 

Being this candid isn’t something Severus is used to, isn’t something he has ever liked. It doesn’t come easy to him, just as some types of intimacy don’t. He doesn’t like feeling exposed, and knows that he shouldn’t be, especially not now. 

“Yeah,” Longbottom breathes. He is leaned forward, at the edge of his seat. 

“Is there anything you didn’t like?” 

His mouth feels swollen, his tongue feels too big, too wet. 

“My back hurt like that, bent over,” he says. He laughs. “Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. I should have thought of that.”

“I liked it when you touched me.”

He says it unprompted, like he just wanted to get it out. Needed to. He’s glancing up, carefully, somehow boldly. He hesitated only slightly when he said it. 

“I can do that too,” Severus breathes. 

He grins, his teeth white and straight. “Right now?”

Severus wants to. He wants to so bad it hurts. He also knows he hasn’t survived this long doing what he does without being able to control himself. 

“No,” he says and before Longbottom can open his mouth to protest, he continues, “No, we have to talk first.”

The Veritaserum will wear off soon, and he’s asked almost everything he needs to. Almost.

“I want you to tell me if,” he starts and stops and starts again. “Will you tell me if you’re not comfortable with anything?”

Longbottom shrugs, says with a smile, “Sure. Yeah, I will.”

“Good. Do you know what a safeword is?”

Longbottom is still smiling, shakes his head. It’s not a no, it seems like, just a gesture of disbelief. “Yeah, I know what a safeword is.”

“Think of one for tomorrow night.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you for all your lovely comments?? you're all darlings. 
> 
> this chapter contained a lot of Emotional Fucking and really not a lot of Real Fucking, but just wait for the next chapter, which contains not only Real Fucking but also - actual plot!!!
> 
> other notes: i made up a lot of stuff about Veritaserum this chapter, and i sure will continue to pull fake magical facts straight out of my ass.


	4. Chapter Four

Chapter Four

Neville sits in class, thinks about Snape touching him. He guesses it’s fantasizing if it hasn’t really happened. He thinks about the possibility of it happening tonight. He fiddles with his pencil, not really paying attention to anything Professor Flitwick is saying.

“Neville,” Luna mumbles, hands him a carefully folded note. In her spindly handwriting there is a series of seemingly unrelated questions, ranging from what his middle name is to what he thinks his future spouse will be like. 

“What’s this?” he murmurs, leaning over to her side of the desk.

“It’s a quiz. Clone quiz. It’s information I need in case I ever need to tell you apart from a clone,” she whispers back seriously. “I will of course burn it after I memorize it, otherwise what would be the point?”

“Yeah, sure,” he says, starts to fill it out. He never knows if she’s serious with these things, sometimes she seems to enjoy messing with people, saying outrageous or unbelievable things just to throw people off. She’s never really as crazy as people make her out to be. He plays along, and she smiles at him. 

He wonders if they could have been a thing. If things weren’t like they are. It’s not like hasn’t thought about it before. Not seriously though, not really. Every time it pops into his head it has always felt like a breach of trust to mull it over seriously. 

“Dark eyes?” someone says over his shoulder. It’s Ginny, leaning over to glance at the answers he’s scribbling on the paper. 

“Don’t snoop,” he says, puts a protective hand over the paper. Ginny jabs him softly in the side and snatches it right out of his hand. 

“That’s important information,” Luna says, frowns. 

“Of course it is, Luna,” Ginny says, as she dodges Neville’s attempts to grab it, “how else would we know about Neville’s deep desire for ‘dark eyes, thin fingers and-‘ what does that last thing say?”

She giggles and Neville smiles against himself. “Give it back,” he says. The students next to them have started looking up, wondering why everyone’s talking all of a sudden.

“No, tell me what you wrote first,” she laughs. 

“You know, Neville, I intended it to be more about characteristics in general, not looks,” Luna whispers, smiling gently. 

“Yeah, Luna, thanks. I got that, I wasn’t finished,” Neville says, finally getting a hold of the piece of paper. He points to the last question, his hard to read scribbles, “It says ‘integrity and humour’.”

Is Snape funny? He knows who he’s described, without thinking about it. 

“Oh wow, busting out all those long, complicated words.” Ginny sits down in her seat again, still laughing to herself.

“If you hadn’t interrupted me I could have written an essay,” Neville says and almost winks. “Now you only get a handful of words. What was that thing you said about patience and discretion last meeting?”

“That they’re for dorks,” Ginny says and Neville snorts. There’s a beat, and then Ginny is leaning over to them again. “I need to talk to you two about something later.”

“What?” Neville asks, and glances back towards her.

“A thing. I thought of something. DA business,” she says and leans back in her chair. 

She won’t say anything else about it until lunch. If that wasn’t enough to tell them it’s important, how Ginny glances at the guards the Carrows have put out in the Great Hall ensures it, how she mumbles muffling spells under her breath screams it. 

She wants them to steal the Sword of Gryffindor. 

“You see, I’ve been thinking about it. Dumbledore left it to Harry in his will, right? So it must be important that he has it, it must be,” she says. She looks a little bit crazy, but it’s not a bad look for her. 

“That’s crazy,” Neville says, when she stops to breathe. “How would we get it to Harry?” 

She looks annoyed. “That doesn’t matter right now. It’s in Snape’s office, right? We can grab it from there and keep it in the Room of Requirement until we know what to do with it. There’s got to be a way to get it to him during Christmas holidays.”

“What are you going to do, stuff a sword in a bag and carry it onto the train?”

“We could wrap it in something,” Luna says, deep in thought. “Say it’s a new broom you got in the mail or something. It could work.”

Neville sighs, looks around. “It’s a long way from spray painting a few walls, Ginny, a long way from flooding a hallway.”

“Yeah. I know.”

They look at each other, serious. Alone in this. 

“All right,” Neville says. 

Afternoon classes and dinner are hell. There is this other important question: should he tell them? About what he does at Snape’s those nights? It would help this plan, he knows it. He doesn’t want to tell them, knows that’s selfish. He knows he can’t tell Snape. He knows a lot, has to balance all those thoughts in his head, has to keep things from people. Lie. He wants to not think, he needs to. 

When he gets to Snape he’s exhausted, tired to the bone. 

“How are you?” Snape asks, surprisingly. He stands in the middle of the room, almost awkwardly.

“Um, good,” Neville says, then smiles. “Tired, I guess.”

“If you want to-“

“No, I want to do this,” Neville says. “Please, sir.”

Snape nods and then they stand there, do nothing. 

“Should we start then, or whatever? Where do you want me?”

“Desk,” he says, gestures with one hand. Neville does as he’s told, rounds the table and looks at him.

“On the chair,” Snape continues, and Neville looks at the plain wooden chair there instead of the armchair usually there. The chair is facing outward, the back against the edge of the desk. “It’s more comfortable.”

Neville puts his knees on the chair, leans forward over the back of it and places his forearms on the desk. Kneeling like this, he’s higher up and can put more weight on his arms, doesn’t have to bend down as low.

“Do you want a pillow? For your arms?”

“No,” Neville says. “I’m good.”

He can only hear Snape now, not see him. He’s behind him, gently nudging his knees into what he guesses is a better position. His voice is low, his hands cold. 

“Tell me if that changes. Do you have a safeword?”

“Yeah, right,” Neville says, leans his head on the desk. “Um, no. I forgot.”

“I will have to punish you for that,” Snape says, calm. Neville shivers. He’s running his hands down his back, down his legs. Smoothing down the fabric, no not really, just touching him. “If you want, we could use red, yellow?”

Neville tries to turn his head, and Snape seems to understand. 

“’Red’ if I should stop, ‘yellow’ if I should slow down,” he says. “Do you understand?”

“Yeah,” Neville says and Snape does that thing again, yanks on his hair. He gasps. “Sorry. I mean, yes, sir.”

He lets him go gently, his head falling back against the desk. 

“Could you unbutton your trousers, please?” he asks, too polite, and as Neville does so, he continues, “What do you want me to use? Cane? Paddle?” 

“Um,” Neville says, tries to breathe, leans forward on the desk when his pants are unbuttoned, doesn’t pull them down. “I don’t know, sir. Y-you decide, please.”

He hates that he stutters but then Snape pulls his shirt loose, slides his fingers up over his back, and they are skin to skin. Snape feels cold, feels calm and strong and in control. Neville sighs, his heart racing. He wonders if Snape can feel the fluttering pulse through his skin.

“Cane,” Snape says, sounds like he’s talking mostly to himself. He walks away now, Neville can hear his steps disappear and then appear again. He stands on the other side of the desk now, with a tool in his hand. It doesn’t look like a walking cane, which is what Neville imagined, but is thinner, shorter. Snape takes one end in one hand and bends it slightly, to show Neville how it works, he thinks. “It might break the skin,” he says, pausing to make sure Neville understands, or agrees. “You’ll look… You’ll look lovely.”

And then he walks around the desk, and out of Neville’s field of vision. He puts the cane down next to Neville, and then he can feel his hands at his waist, gently pushing his pants out of the way, halfway down his thighs. He strokes him, as the other hand reaches for the cane. He grabs, squeezes the soft parts of his ass, appraisingly almost. Neville feels scared, feels excited, feels calm. 

“I want you to count again,” Snape says. “Do you understand?” 

“Yes, sir,” Neville says. 

“Do you know your safewords?”

“Yes, sir. Red for stop, yellow for slow down,” Neville says, anticipation building. 

Snape strikes. The sound the cane makes when it moves through the air is a soft ‘whoosh’, and then when it hits there is a softer noise, different from the paddle. The feeling is different too, hurts in a different way, more sharply, and it knocks the air out of him. 

“One,” Neville says, and he can hear the loud exhale from Snape from behind him. 

\--

He keeps counting unprompted up to ten, and then Severus has to remind him. He’s not used to it, it’s alright. 

He looks lovely. Severus takes a moment between the strikes to watch the red marks appear, the welts, thin red lines of agitated skin across his backside. Red and then pale white, light hair sparsely on his thighs and the lower back. 

“What colour?” Severus asks, and it takes a moment for him to respond. 

“Not red, sir,” he chokes out. He’s crying, or has been. 

Severus hits him again, gets a small choked whine in return. He counts again, being so good.

When he pauses to see if he is going to start bleeding, Longbottom shifts, mumbles something. 

Severus leans in, has already decided to stop now, “Excuse me?”

He mumbles again, tries to lift his hand and only manages to shift it around sloppily. And then, clearly, though dreamy, “Yellow, now, maybe.” 

Severus puts the cane down, reaches into his desk. “You did well,” he says.

Longbottom laughs almost, wobbles off the chair. Severus grabs him with one arm around the waist, tries to level him out.

“Stay still,” he says, “You should-“

“No, I wanna lie down,” Longbottom says, leaning on the desk. He laughs again, “That was great.”

Severus wants to kiss him, but doesn’t. Of course. He strokes down his side instead, holds him steady, puts his clothes back in order. They’re both still breathing rapidly, together. He stops to grab the healing lotion from his desk, then helps Longbottom down on the sofa, sits down next to him. He’s clingy and warm, grabs at Severus’ clothes, his arms. He buries his face in his shirt, and Severus feels like screaming. His arm is around the boy’s shoulders, moving with his breathing. It feels heavy, like it belongs to someone else. There’s something close to panic rumbling around inside his head, his chest, radiating out into his limbs, and then Longbottom looks up at him. 

“Is this okay?” he says, and Severus nods almost immediately. Of course. Longbottom smiles, all teeth, slow and lovely, then ducks his head back down. They sit like that until Longbottom is breathing slowly, calmly. “That was great,” Longbottom repeats, his voice muffled by almost sleep. 

“Yes,” Severus says, then squeezes his arm slowly. “Does it hurt?”

“A bit,” Longbottom says, yawns. “How does it look?” He gently pulls down his underwear, moves forward to be able to stretch out more, and turns his head to look. He gives up halfway, leans back again.

“Did I… Did I do it right, or…” he sounds coy but then laughs to himself.

“You were lovely,” Severus says and Longbottom’s smile widens. He wants to touch him, wants to reward him, for being so lovely, for giving him this. It reminds him of Lily, that smile. Like a gift, just for him, given without even thinking about it. He would spend hours thinking about that smile.

No, they’re different. Certainly in looks – where Lily was tall and lean and filled with colour, Longbottom is soft and pale and pliant. In personality, well, can Severus really say anything? He thinks now, so many years later that maybe he never knew Lily, not really, not in any way that matters. He wanted her and he wanted her to be something larger than life, something outlandish that couldn’t really exist and then never did. Does he know Longbottom any better? Know him as anything other than what he wants him to be?

“Let me help with the bruising.”

Longbottom shifts. “Yeah, sure,” he says. He crawls so that he lies across Severus’ lap, and tugs his clothes out of the way. 

It’s more than bruising. Horizontally there are stripes of raised flesh, an irritated and swollen red. In two places the skin has broken, and Severus carefully touches his fingers to it. “Does that hurt?” he asks and Longbottom shakes his head, with some trouble since it is now buried in the cushions.

Severus starts to rub the lotion in, is generous. The marks don’t disappear, but fade the longer he goes on. He looks so good, relaxed and sated leaned against him and the soft sofa cushions, and Severus suspects he is starting to drift off. His legs keep falling open, only staying on the sofa because of the clothes still tangled around his bottom half. 

He makes a gentle noise to rouse him, gets no reaction. He strokes up under the boy’s shirt, frees more skin. He has pale freckles sprinkled across his back sparsely and Severus lets his fingers go from one to the other, up to his shoulder blades. “Neville?” he murmurs, surprising himself.

He doesn’t open his eyes but mumbles something that it takes Severus a moment to understand. “That feels good,” is what he mumbles, mouth wet and open against the cushions. He’s half hard, has been for a while, Severus can feel it against his thigh. Severus doesn’t blame him, if he was that age he’d get hard by a gust of wind. 

He lets his hand rest against Neville’s hip, lets his thumb stroke over the soft curve of his ass. ‘Lets it’ as if he is giving in to someone else’s will, as if it’s not really him doing this. He pushes down, feels the flesh giving in. Neville moans softly, half asleep. Severus can feel himself smiling, his face tight.

“You’re so pretty,” he says, can’t stop himself. “Pretty when you fight with me, pretty like this, pretty when I bend you over my desk.”

Neville groans an affirmation, opens his eyes, lids heavy. When Severus slides his fingers in between his cheeks, the eyes grow large. “Do you want me to stop?” he asks, and Neville shakes his head. 

The tips of his fingers stroke, and then push down gently, earns him a gasp. He doesn’t want this to hurt, so he reaches for the lotion, and when he returns his fingers they glide even smoother. When he pushes his index finger past the ring of muscle, it glides smoothly. 

He has only the tip of his finger inside him, but Neville is gasping anyway, cutting off short breaths by squeezing his lips together. He’s so responsive. With his other hand, Severus strokes his back to calm him down, or maybe just to touch him. Neville’s hands are clutching at the cushions. Severus wonders that if he adds another finger, the boy will start to grind down into his thigh, try for more friction. Turns out, he’s right. With two fingers in him, he gasps and arches his back, then grinds his hips down towards whatever will meet it. 

“Have you done this before?” Severus asks, can’t keep his eyes off him.

Neville nods, seemingly too far off to feel embarrassed. “Yeah.”

“With someone else?” Severus works his fingers in and out, shifts his angle.

“No, I did it,” Neville says and at that thought Severus wants to explode.

“Turn over,” he says. “Turn over.”

Neville looks surprised, says, “Did I do something?”

Severus should kiss him. Instead he turns him over, shifts them around and puts his mouth on his hipbone. Licks a line to his navel, tries to keep his mouth soft and relaxed. He wants to bite him, wants to mark him, leave traces of himself all over him. He bites down on a spot right below his navel, just testing, and Neville sucks in a breath, doesn’t seem to know if he wants to recoil or push closer.

From his navel there is a trail of pale blonde hair downwards. He’s hard, looks almost painfully so. It’s flattering, even if Severus knows it’s more age than anything else, more the situation than him. Severus wants to taste him. 

He licks, slowly, to the tip where a drop of precum dribbles lazily. He tastes like salt, like sweat and something else. Severus mouths at him and then looks up. Neville looks dazed again, his mouth is open. “Shit,” he says. 

“Watch your mouth,” Severus says and then swallows him. 

“Shit,” he says again, “Oh God.”

Severus hasn’t done this in a while, doesn’t really think it matters though, by the way Neville gasps and moans. He throws his head back against the cushions, closes his eyes, scrunches his face up. Severus pulls back, just to watch him whine, beg. He does, goes ‘pleasepleaseplease’, and Severus smiles. 

“Beg me,” he says.

“Please!” he says, looks desperate. “Please, sir, I just want-“

“Say my name,” he says, doesn’t know that’s what he wants until he says it out loud. “Severus – say it.”

“Mmm, yes, please, Severus,” he says, nods. “Please, touch me.”

He does, bobs his head and swipes his tongue over the head and then Neville’s coming. The noise he makes is precious, more like an absence of a noise, a strangled end to the blabbering. Severus swallows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> unrealistic emotional maturity but hey
> 
> stay tuned for more actual plot and more actual smut!


	5. Chapter Five

Okay, so getting fingered by Severus Snape on a shabby but oddly comfortable sofa, in the headmaster’s office. That wasn’t really the plan? With his life. Or with anything really. Getting the best blowjob of his life and ending it embarrassingly early was also not the plan. 

He lies and stares up at the high stone ceiling as Snape cleans up, puts him back in his clothes. The quiet just stretches on, the only noise the crackling of the dying fire. How long has he been here? Shit.

“What time is it?” he asks, and Snape turns to him. 

“Late,” he says, and sits down, looks at the clock on the wall. “Eleven.”

“Oh,” Neville says, awkwardly. “I missed curfew.”

“A benefit of doing extracurriculars with the headmaster is that I can write you a note,” Snape says. He looks dishevelled, sweaty. Neville realises now he hasn’t touched him yet.

“You didn’t-“ he says, hopes his glance to Snape’s crotch will get the message through. 

“It’s fine,” he says, his thin fingers intertwined in front of him.

“You didn’t…? Like it?” he asks, and Snape leans forward. 

“Don’t,” Snape says, sounding almost too brusque, then looks away. “It was fine.”

“You were great, I was, um, it was over pretty quick. I know.”

Snape is quiet for a moment. “You have done that before, right?”

“Oh, what? Yeah, of course I have.” He laughs, mostly because he’s embarrassed. “So it was bad then?”

Snape shakes his head slightly, “I usually don’t feel the need for analysis afterwards. Your second guessing doesn’t signal experienced.”

Neville opens his mouth, then shuts it. No, it doesn’t. He’s only ever been on the receiving end twice, has never done it himself. With girls he has, but he guesses that’s not really the same thing. Well, a girl. Once. 

Snape starts talking again, leans in, “You have to leave. We don’t have time.”

“I don’t have to leave,” Neville says, tries to look charming. 

Snape snorts out something that is almost a laugh. “Yes, you do.”

He writes him a note. It’s short, only says he has permission to be in the halls, that he’s had detention. Neville reads it on his way back to the dorm. Snape has written out his full name, Neville Longbottom, some letters spindly and the vowels short and stocky. The e’s are thin, and short, the N and L long and thin. He’s not proud but when he gets back to his bed, he folds it, carefully places it in the back of the notebook he keeps in his bedside table.

He falls asleep touching the spot where Snape’s teeth had sunk in. There’s this way Snape has of touching him, entitled, not like Neville is a possession, but not totally different either. And Neville thinks yes, he gave him that, he gave him permission to do that. It’s flattering, that he wants to. Neville feels sated, calm, owned.

That must be sick, there must be some sort of name for it. That’s what his grandmother says, of things she doesn’t agree with. ‘Oh there must be a name for that,’ she says heatedly into Neville’s ear as they walk out of the grocery store or into a café, when she sees something she finds appalling. Neville groans into his pillow. 

The next morning he oversleeps, doesn’t wake up until Seamus shouts at him across the room, already fully dressed. The smothering fear is back, so present it’s amazing he could ever forget it in the first place.

He doesn’t tell anyone. Not Seamus, not Ginny, not Luna. He just goes on with his days, planning this heist they’ll never get away with, building up anxiety and then knocking on Snape’s door and getting his head emptied. 

Snape ties him up, in the sofa in his office. Uses Neville’s own tie, ties his hands over his head and jerks him off slowly. It’s good. So good. Afterwards, Snape tells him how pretty he looked and Neville tucks his head up under his chin, can feel the his stubble against his cheek. 

They do other things and Neville always leaves feeling lighter, empty. Snape still won’t let him touch him for some reason, and Neville feels a little hurt. It’s not like that would make anything worse. He sits in class and wonders what’s wrong, if Snape is hiding something or is ashamed? But no, he’s seen it. Snape touches himself sometimes, when he’s going down on Neville, or he palms himself through his pants when Neville is bent over his desk. 

To summarize, he spends too much time thinking about Snape, about Snape’s body, about what Snape thinks of him.

They’re planning on breaking into his office at night after the Christmas dinner, before everyone leaves for break. Neville can see the glass case where he keeps the sword every night, tries not to stare at it. It would be so easy. To ask Snape if he could see it, just for a second, just take it out of the case for a second. Or he could slip Snape something. Although he must drink antidotes to almost everything. He must know the entire school hates him, wishes he’d go away. Neville has told him more than once.

Neville shouts at him a lot. Gets him riled up, so he’ll throw him around a bit. They have rules for that too. Neville can’t use anything Snape tells him when they take Veritaserum. They don’t really do that again though, because Neville usually wants something else. What he wants is to be in that empty space Snape puts him in, using his hands and his mouth and his body. 

Neville uses his safeword only once in a month, when Snape grabs his wrist a bit too tight, forces his arm behind his back. Snape lets him go right away, apologizes tersely. He holds his head in his hands and kisses his cheek, tender. Somehow, that works too, to keep Neville’s mind off the things he doesn’t want to think about.

Ginny has broken up the plan into three separate parts. Getting into the office, getting into the case, getting out of the office. They know there are locking charms on the door and there must be on the case as well, and then they have to carry the sword out of there and all the way to the Room of Requirement. Piece of cake. They ask Seamus for help, mostly because he’s moping around so much that Neville’s afraid he’ll do something stupid to himself. They keep it from the rest of the DA. They know they’re planning something, and some people have asked if they can help, but it’s easier the less people know about it. They’ve advised people to go home earlier for Christmas, to miss the Christmas dinner, thinking that they’re less likely to get questioned (if they get caught) if they’re scattered. 

They sit in the boy’s dorm one Saturday afternoon in late November, Ginny on the floor, surrounded by her notes, Luna on Neville’s bed, Seamus slouched against the bed and Neville on the edge of his seat. They all know he still has detention, he tries to give them regular updates, at least when they ask. Whether Snape has moved the sword, whether Neville’s overheard him talking about it, happened to read a note about it. He tells them no, no, no. And then, this Saturday, Ginny turns to him.

She looks reserved, apprehensive in a way that makes Neville nervous. “Would you be willing to do something kinda dangerous, Neville?”

Neville swallows. “What?”

She looks stern now. “We have to take advantage of the fact that you’re there every night, right? It’d be stupid not to.”

To Neville’s relief, Seamus jumps in from his place on the floor, says, “Yeah, but what can he do? If it’s something real risky, Snape would know it was him, he’d get in trouble.”

“Yeah, I know. He won’t know it’s you, Neville,” she says, looks intently at him. Then goes, “I got my hands on a portkey.”

Seamus huffs out a laugh, “What? How?”

“Doesn’t matter,” Ginny says, and runs a hand through her hair. “I got one, and I think I can make it work.”

“No, you can’t,” Neville says bluntly. “It won’t work on Hogwarts grounds.”

Now Luna looks up, shakes her head. “No, this one is different. There’s two of them.”

Neville turns to her, “What, have you two been making plans together?”

Luna looks down at her hands, shrugs. 

“Quit it with the sibling rivalry,” Ginny says, waves her hand between them. “Yeah, Luna’s been tinkering with this one and I think it might work. I’ve been reading up on Hogwarts’ security wards. This portkey, these portkeys, seems like this sort of , what did you call it?”

“Closed circuit,” Luna says, shuffling papers around in front of her. “You see, it works like this, instead of one portkey having an open-ended position, when you charm it to take you somewhere, it just goes between these two portkeys. It’s an easier charm, more likely to go unnoticed. And since we’re not trying to transport it out of Hogwarts grounds, it should work.”

“Yeah,” Ginny says, nodding along, then turns to Neville. “And then when it’s time, we touch the portkey in here, or wherever, transport into his office, take the sword, unlock the door and leave.”

“Isn’t that illegal?” Seamus says. “Unauthorized portkeys?”

“No,” Ginny says. “Well, yeah, but we’re not creating a portkey, we’re just tampering with two existing ones. And yeah, it might be a bit illegal, but you have to live a little, right?”

“So you need me to leave a portkey in Snape’s office?” Neville interrupts.

“Yeah, I mean, the greasy asshole has to look away sometime, right?” Ginny says, probably feeling his apprehension. 

It’s not that he doesn’t dare. What is it? That he’s afraid of betraying Snape’s trust? He’s a Death Eater. He is a bad man. A bad man who tells Neville he is good and pretty and who touches him like they’re always going to be touching each other, like his hands were meant to touch Neville. 

“I can try,” Neville says. “What is it? The portkey?”

Ginny pulls something out of her bag, grins. “Fitting, right?”

In her hand is a comb, plane and plastic, not big. 

“You can have it now,” Ginny says, “It’s not active yet. You’ll have to do that.”

She holds it out to him and he takes it. God damn it.

\--

It’s not time yet. Not until tomorrow. It’s not a very good plan. Or, well, it’s better than could be expected of a bunch of teenagers, he guesses. They only have a half-assed plan about how they’ll break into the glass case where he keeps the sword, but Ginny keeps saying they don’t have to worry. Of course Neville is going to worry. Worry is all he does.

“Do you have any Veritaserum?” Neville asks, as soon as he steps into the room, almost. He wants to be convinced he’s doing the right thing. No, he knows he’s doing the right thing, wants it to be easier making that choice. 

Snape is locking the door, standing behind him, as he sits down in the sofa. Neville looks at him, waiting. 

“Yes, I do,” Snape says. “Make yourself comfortable.”

It’s not really a good night for him. He’s nervous, hasn’t eaten properly, will probably mess this up. Will definitely mess this up. He can feel it, like a heavy stone in his belly, this imminent doom. 

Snape is back with two glasses and a bottle of red wine. 

“No, I don’t want any,” Neville says and then feels bad. “Sorry, sir. I’m fine with water or something.” 

“Fine,” Snape says, puts the glass down and procures some water for Neville, pours himself a small amount of wine. He pulls the vial of clear liquid out of his pocket and lets three drops fall in each glass.

Neville takes the glass, doesn’t drink it yet, waits for Snape to down his wine in one go, and then refill it. He glances across the office, over to the glass case and Then he drinks, empties the glass, and there is that familiar tug, stronger this time somehow. 

“Why does it feel different? Did you do something new?” Neville asks and Snape nods. 

“Every batch is different,” he says quietly. 

Snape seems more short with him than usual. Does he suspect that they’re planning something? He seems like the sort of person who suspects everyone, always.

“Do you want to go first?” Neville asks, and Snape shrugs. “Okay, I can go first.”

He pauses, tries to think of something nice.

“How did you learn Occlumency?” he says, something he’s been curious about. 

“Practice,” Snape says. “I practiced with a witch in Wales, then later with Albus.”

It takes Neville a moment to understand he’s talking about Dumbledore. Right. He knows that’s his first name, of course, but it’s hard to think of someone being on first name basis with him. Being on first name basis and then, well. It reminds Neville just of how separate their lives are, how completely different. Snape is looking at him intently, doing that thing where he simultaneously makes it obvious he is watching him and that he is disinterested. It works surprisingly well. 

Snape gently taps his fingers against the leather chair. “Have you told anyone what we do when you’re here?”

“No!” Neville says, maybe too forcefully. “No, of course I haven’t.”

Snape nods, says, “I didn’t think you had. I just, know teenagers.”

Neville’s not sure, but that’s almost certainly an insult. This is why they don’t do this often. Snape is so very bad at not making him angry. Neville laughs.

“Yeah, sure,” and then, “How old are you anyway?”

Snape shakes his head, looks away. “I’m 38.”

Neville laughs. “You’re the oldest person I’ve ever been with.” Revels in how Snape knows that’s true, hopes he’s offended.

“Really? That’s unimpressive,” Snape says instead, coolly.

“Why? Who’s the-?” Neville starts, a bit too heated. The point of this game is seeming unmoved by what the other person is saying, seeming unfazed, while saying things he wouldn’t ever say otherwise. Snape is winning. Snape smirks before he interrupts him.

“No, my turn to ask,” he says. “You said before that I wasn’t your first. Who was?”

The words, ‘your first’, don’t make sense to Neville, seem like a silly label. His heart beats quickly at the thought of Snape remembering what he said, thinking about it enough to want to ask him about it. “Her name was Emily,” he says, and no he doesn’t seem unfazed at all now.

Snape raises his eyebrows. “Was?”

“She’s not dead or anything. As far as I know. I just haven’t seen her in a while,” Neville says, shifts in his seat.

“Tell me about it,” Snape says before Neville can interrupt him and now he has to respond, the potion making it impossible not to talk.

“It wasn’t your turn,” he says anyway, stalling.

Snape smirks again, takes a sip of his drink.

Neville sighs. “She’s my neighbour, at my grandmother’s house. A muggle. She used to lie in the backyard when it was sunny out, in her bikini.”

“Sounds like a romance novel already,” he says, looks amused.

“Yeah, well,” Neville says, wants to stop talking, can’t. “She used to wear braids, she had this long black hair down to her waist that she used to fold to the side when she sunbathed. She was really sweet to me. And then one day she had a party and we got drunk and we had sex.”

Neville shrugs and looks down into his empty glass.

“Did you-?”

“No, I won’t tell you anymore unless you tell me about your first time.”

Snape shakes his head, takes a sip. His glass is almost empty now. “I don’t want to know that badly,” he says, but Neville can see it on him, how the potion is working. 

He tilts his head to the right. “Tell me. Who it was with, where were you, what did you do?”

“I…” Snape starts, leans forward onto his knees. “I studied in Russia a time after graduating, at Koldovstoretz. No,” he corrects, “I wasn’t enrolled, I went to study in a specialized summer course, under Nikolaj Nygaard. Do you know who that is?”

Neville shakes his head and Snape continues his level explanation. 

“He is, was, a brilliant Potions master, originally from Norway. Blond, of course. Tall.” Snape keeps that same tone of voice throughout. Calm, quiet. “I admired him,” he says, then blinks. “No, I adored him.”

“Sweet,” Neville says. This isn’t part of his plan. This isn’t a story a bad man tells, is it?

Snape sneers for a moment, then seems to ignore him. “He invited me up for a coffee one time and then he put his hand on my thigh, told me I had a gift. A future in potions making.”

Neville is mesmerised. This feels like a gift, like he’s hearing something forbidden, something Snape hasn’t told anyone, ever. A secret. “What then?” he asks, almost whispering.

Snape leans back in his chair, frowns for a moment, taps his fingers against the chair again. He seems antsy, maybe even nervous? 

“Then he kissed me,” he says, smiling slightly. When he talks next, he uses his hands to gesture, something Neville has noticed he rarely does. “I remember that his hotel room had the most beautiful view. I was positioned in a way that I could see out the window, out over the valley below. The little houses, the little people.”

“That sounds nice,” Neville says, wants to touch him.

“It’s sentimental drivel,” Snape drawls, sounds like he’s mocking him. “Anyway, after the course was over he went home to his wife and kids in Norway. He passed away some years ago,” Snape says, voice still level.

“How old were you?” Neville asks, doesn’t know what else to say. Will he be telling a story like this in the future? ‘Do you know who Severus Snape is, dark hair of course, tall?’

“Nineteen,” Snape says.

Neville fiddles with his glass, doesn’t want to look at him for the next bit. 

“How old was he?”

“When he died he was sixty, that year he was… fifty-two I think,” Snape says, dark eyes gleaming. “So, now you talk about your dark Emily with the braids.”

“It wasn’t anything special,” he says. “She had a party, we got drunk.”

“You owe me more than that,” Snape says.

“It was awkward. I think she was just bored,” he says, tries to remember some detail that will make Snape happy. “We were in her parents’ room, with the lights off. I don’t even remember what she looked like naked.”

“Pity,” Snape says, dripping with sarcasm.

“It was over pretty quick,” Neville shrugs. “I spent most of the time fumbling around with the condom.”

Snape nods. “Do you think you’ll want to do it again? With a woman?”

“Sleep with a girl again? Sure,” Neville says, hasn’t really thought about it. “I mean, yeah. I like girls. Not just girls,” he says. Obviously, he wants to add, but at the same time, doesn’t want to admit he likes Snape. “Have you ever had sex with a woman?”

\--

The story is precious. Sounds like a page out of his diary. He wonders if the boy has one, what he wrote in it that night before going to bed. If he felt ‘different’, more mature, more adult. He wants to see it, wonders if some day Neville will let him see that memory. 

Severus didn’t feel different after having sex. He felt sore and proud maybe. Proud that someone as important would pay attention to him, think he himself was important. For a summer at least.

“No,” Severus says, in answer to his question.

“Well, have you ever fancied one?”

“Yes,” Severus says, doesn’t want to answer the question. Really doesn’t want to answer the next question he’s sure will come. He’s so tired, has come straight from a meeting with his colleagues, all of them angry and scared. Except for the Carrows of course, standing behind him like bodyguards the whole time. Thinking of them makes his head explode into a searing headache.

He really doesn’t want this.

“Who?” 

“Lily Evans,” he says, thinks that he might get away with just that but feels the hardness of the potion inside him. “Her married name was Potter.”

Neville’s eyes go a tiny bit wider, a comical reaction, then he laughs. “What? Like the Lily Potter?”

“We went to Hogwarts together,” Severus says, like that’s an explanation. “Lived near each other when we were children.”

“Harry’s mother?” Neville asks, sounds like something clicks into place. 

Severus nods. He doesn’t like this, doesn’t like talking about this at all. Does he love her still? Loving Lily has always been the best part of him, always been the bright spot inside him. Even after she was gone, especially then. Not enough light for real goodness, but something to aspire to. 

Lately he has questioned this. Thinks that maybe it dirties her, the memory of her, to have to bear that responsibility in his mind. 

He tugs at his shirt sleeves, wants to cover up. The boy doesn’t notice how uneasy he is, he thinks. The only emotion he has trouble hiding these days is anger. 

“Did she fancy you back?” the boy asks, and Severus feels a deep pit inside him opening up. He really hadn’t thought this would be such a sore spot, not talking to a boy half his age about this.

“No, she didn’t. She loved James,” Severus says. “James Potter. He was beneath her, a bully, scum. She should have-“ Severus says and then abruptly stops talking. What should she have done? 

“I’m sorry,” Neville says and it’s the knowledge that he actually means it that is so pitiful, so disgusting.

Severus waves it away, can’t think of anything to say that won’t be a lie or simply pathetic.

“Wasn’t she a muggleborn?”

“Yes, she was,” Severus says, so very tired. 

“And you were a Death Eater? Maybe… it wasn’t really so odd then?” 

They have rules. He can’t use this to aggravate him, he can’t say this.

“I wasn’t always a Death Eater,” he says instead. 

“No, but you have to like… You don’t go from nothing to Death Eater, right?” 

“You don’t understand what it was like. I was a Slytherin, the thinking was-“ He stands up. He doesn’t have to explain himself, what is he doing?

“What was the thinking like?” Neville says, sounds amused. God damn it, Severus had been doing so well.

“You’re being stupid,” Severus says, tries to sound intimidating. 

Neville snorts, but won’t meet his eyes. He waits until Severus has calmed down, has sat down in his chair, to ask, “Okay. Have you ever killed anyone?”

“No questions about the war,” Severus reminds, seething. There seems to have been a switch flipped in the boy’s head. Severus has said something wrong, done something wrong and now this stupid, ignorant teenage boy thinks he has the right to punish him.

“It’s not technically a question about the war, though, is it? I mean, as far as I know, you could be a serial killer in your spare time. Or does knocking me around a bit dampen that urge?”

He can’t fight it. He knows he can’t fight it. It takes a certain frame of mind to do this, to prepare for lying under Veritaserum. He’s not there tonight. And why should he, why should he spend energy on hiding this from a school boy? 

“Have you ever killed anyone?” Neville says again, slowly, enunciating each word.

“Don’t do this,” Severus says and Neville looks almost regretful. “You already know the answer.”

“Why can’t you say it?” His tone of voice is determined, almost on the verge of cold. 

How did it come to this? Severus hadn’t thought the boy capable of being this, not cruel, but direct maybe? Not without being provoked. And why can’t Severus admit to this? It’s almost unbearable now, the feeling of having to spill his secrets, of wanting to spill them. He breathes. 

“Yes, I have,” he says finally. “Does that scare you?”

Why is he so concerned with what this tempestuous, pathetic child thinks? (He knows why, hates himself for it, hates Neville for it.)

“Yes.”

The word is said quietly, without hesitation. There’s an impact afterward, a cold silence. Severus would have thought that there would be pride, or even happiness, that he has managed to instil fear in this creature, but instead he feels something close to shame. Fear feels like a long step from respect at the moment.

“Why did you do it?” he asks.

“I… I made a difficult decision.” No, that’s not right. “I did it because I was told to.” It wasn’t his decision to make. “I killed him because he told me to.”

Neville nods, mumbles an, “Okay.”

Severus wants to tell him, wants to tell him he is a good man, he did what was right, what was asked of him. But it’s not true. He feels just anger now, at himself, at Albus, at Neville. At the world for never giving him a second of rest. He wants to tell him who he was working for, who he still works for and why. That it wasn’t on the Dark Lord’s orders but on Albus’. He wants him to know, about him, about who he is. It’s a bad sign. 

If he told him and the Dark Lord got his hands on Neville he would kill him. He would kill them both. He would torture them, torture them like they tortured his parents, until they don’t know the name or face of their own child.

He realises it’s possible now, to resist the potion. Finally.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I make a lot of stuff up in this chapter as well. Hope you liked it!


	6. Chapter Six

It’s easier, going through with the plan. Hearing him say those words, say that he killed Dumbledore, that helped. It’s easier but not easy. Snape is just a bad man, he’s just a man.

Neville fastens the portkey under his desk with gum, when Snape is in the other room. It’s so easy he gets nervous. He activates it with a mumbled spell and when Snape gets back, Neville is sitting on the sofa, takes the offered water and healing potion with a smile.

He’s spanked him with his hand, this time, but won’t use the healing cream, won’t touch him more than he has to it seems. Snape seems almost timid, silent and angry. It had been stiff, almost boring. Good. That makes this easier too.

When Neville gets back to his dorm, Luna, Ginny and Seamus are ready. They wait until after midnight, almost two o’clock, before touching the comb matching the one Neville left in Snape’s office. Everything is so easy, too easy. After they’ve arrived, they all stand there in the empty and dark office, breathing together. It takes them almost 30 seconds to dare to move. 

It feels wrong to be there without him. Neville shakes his head in an attempt to think clearer, only manages to make the nausea from the portkey worse. Luna and Ginny start working on the glass case, mumbling to each other, trying different spells. Now, it gets realistic, now it gets hard. 

Nothing works. The case doesn’t sound off any alarm, but doesn’t open. Time for Seamus, the backup plan. If planning doesn’t work, maybe brute force will. 

Neville sits down in the sofa, watches Seamus as he gets ready, gets out his supplies. He starts on a sound dampening spell. 

“He’s a real interior decorator, isn’t he?” Ginny mumbles, looks around at the dark curtains, the strange items in bottles scattered on the shelves in the book case. She sounds nervous, sounds like she’s just filling the silence. Neville doesn’t answer her. 

And then Seamus looks over at them, whispers, “Okay, get ready.”

Ginny stands up and puts an arm over her face, shields her face. Luna just stands there, until Neville pulls her down next to him, puts his arm around her. Seamus grins, looks a little lost, and then Neville closes his eyes. When he opens them the case is open, scattered glass all over the floor, some on the desk and the rug.

“Wow,” Seamus says, looks happier than he has in some time.

Ginny goes over to the case, and then just stands there and stares.

“Watch out for the glass,” Seamus says, but no one is listening. They gather around Ginny, who has one hand hovering over the handle of the sword. 

It’s beautiful, lined with intricate patterns and what Neville guesses are red rubies. Ginny looks up at them. They’ve discussed this too, that the sword itself might have some spell on it, some security measure, activated by unauthorised hands grabbing it out of the case. 

“I have a good feeling,” Luna says and Ginny looks up, throws her a surprised smile. 

“Yeah,” she says, seems to gather up her courage. “Yeah.”

She grabs it and nothing happens. Nothing at all. Ginny snorts out a muted laugh, locks eyes with Neville. He smiles too, now. They’ve done it. Almost. The portkey only works one way. Now they just have to get back to the Room of Requirement unseen.

Neville stops smiling. This is where the plan has to go wrong. It has to. They’ve studied the routes of the teachers on guard, they have cloaking spells, but no, that can’t be enough. It cannot be this easy. 

When Seamus unlocks the door, swings it open, there is, for a second, only relief when the alarm goes off. That’s the worst part. 

Luna lets out a surprised scream and ducks down when all the lights turn on at the same time, the fire roars into existence, the candles on the wall flickering. All the lights at the same time is overwhelming, and Neville wants to scream too. 

“Jesus, what’s that?” Seamus calls out over the alarm, the loud blaring screaming noise, seemingly coming from every corner of the room. 

“RUN!” Ginny shouts, grabs the sword with both hands. She pushes Seamus out in front of her and they start down the stairs, Luna and Neville following as fast as they can. They run down the stone spiral staircase, and Neville feels like his head is going to explode. The alarm continues to blare, even halfway down the stairs. 

Ginny takes the stairs two at a time, winds up way ahead of them, pulling Seamus along with her. She shouts back, tells them to hurry, and Neville tugs too hard on Luna’s hand. She falls. 

“Oh God, oh sorry, Luna,” he says as she tries to scramble to her feet again. He’s still holding her hand, still trying to get her to move faster, get up faster. “Are you okay? Luna?”

She finally gets her to stand up, can’t see Ginny and Seamus anymore, they’ve disappeared further down the winding stairs. “We have to hurry,” he tells her and she nods, even though she can’t possibly hear him over the alarm. 

They almost trip over each other again, but manage to get down the stairs. Ginny is standing at the end of the hall, both her hands still around the sword. “Move!” she shouts, and then, “Are you okay?”

Neville starts to answer, is so close to Ginny now he can almost touch her, can almost reach out and grab the sword. And then, silence. The alarm stops and they’re left there, staring dumbly at each other, ringing in their ears. And then, far away, footsteps. Neville knows those angry footsteps.

He feels the panic coming on, starting like a tingling at the back of his neck. 

“I can’t move my feet,” comes Seamus’ terrified whisper, followed by Ginny’s angry swearing. 

It must be some sort of freezing charm. Neville can’t move his feet either, can only sway from side to side, can’t even turn around to see Snape come down the stairs. He hears Seamus’ inhale though, sees Ginny’s eyes harden. Oh, no. 

And then, from the other side of the hallway, Amycus Carrow’s hoarse laughter. Neville can never understand how someone can manage to sound so disgusting, all of the time.

“Seems like you caught yourself some-“ Carrow begins with a broad grin.

“Do not speak to me,” Snape says, more like roars. 

Carrow shuts his mouth, looks like a kicked dog for a second before his posture changes, turns into something trying to be threatening. He’s trying to be intimidating now, but only looks like a cocky boy. He starts talking, but no one is listening. Or maybe it’s just Neville, maybe it’s only Neville that is so occupied with tracking Snape’s movements through the hall.

Snape walk slowly around them, ignores him, practically vibrating with rage. Neville can see his hands clench into fists, and then release and fall slack to his side.

“Give me the sword,” he says, slowly. He doesn’t reach out his hand, doesn’t move at all, just looks at Ginny. Stares into her eyes. Neville knows what he’s doing. 

“Hey!” he shouts, before he can think. “Don’t!”

Snape doesn’t look at him, keeps his eyes on Ginny. 

“Hey, Ginny, look away, don’t look at him!” he tries to move again but it’s useless, he can only stretch out an arm. Ginny stares at Snape, at first frowning and then fading into a slack expression. 

Snape at last looks away, takes a step back. Ginny lets out an angry puff, sways forward and spits in Snape’s face.

He says nothing, just takes the sleeve of his robes and wipes his face. Neville is now noticing how he’s dressed, his dark robes only half-buttoned so that the top of the dark dark blue shirt he wears underneath is showing. The thought strikes Neville that the shirt might be pyjamas.

He doesn’t need to think about this now, it’s unnecessary and dangerous.

Carrow is standing behind Snape now, almost pushing into his back, glaring at them. He looks hungry in an unsettling way, not like Snape does. Neville can’t put his finger on it, but there’s something about the predatory way Carrow moves that disgusts him, when the same thing with Snape would make him excited. 

Carrow slinks over to where Neville and Luna are standing, slowly bursts in to a grin. “What were you gonna do with that big old sword?” he asks, her and she frowns.

“Don’t talk to her,” Neville says, earning a glare from both Carrow and Snape. 

Carrow turns back to Luna, grins again. “Oh, you little creep? I could do a lot more than talk,” he says.

And then suddenly Neville can move again and he stumbles forward, almost knocks Carrow over. Carrow lets out a disgusted shout, shoves him away. Neville hits the wall with a dull thud and then lunges forward, gets Luna behind him. Carrow looks scared. Maybe that’s why it’s so off-putting, there’s not much bite behind that bark. And Snape at least doesn’t pick on people weaker than him. Maybe that’s wishful thinking. 

“You set them loose?” he shouts at Snape, raises his wand. 

“You may need to restrain sixteen-year-olds but I do not,” Snape says and Neville wants to laugh out loud. 

“Woke up on the wrong side of the bed, Severus?” Carrow spits back, his wand still half-way raised, moving between Ginny and Seamus, Luna and Neville.

“I was woken up by an alarm at three o’clock in the morning by four imbeciles trying to steal my belongings. Yes, I did wake up on the wrong side of the bed.”

“It doesn’t belong to you,” Luna says deadpan, in that confrontational, non-thinking way she has. 

“It certainly does not belong to you,” Snape growls, stalks forward.

Neville steps in between them, puts a hand up, and Snape looks like he wants to kill him, kill them both. He doesn’t, instead he swipes his hand to the left and Neville is pushed to the side. Neville can see Ginny move forward, and then stop dead in her tracks as her wand flies out of her hand.

“Do not,” Snape says.

It’s bad. It’s very bad. They stand there for what feels like an hour, Snape stalking around, shouting, Carrow getting more and more excited, Neville and the rest of them standing there silently, knowing there’s nothing to be done. At some point Alecto Carrow appears, along with McGonagall and Flitwick and they march them up to Snape’s office. Flitwick looks horrified at the mess, steps carefully around the glass, while McGonagall won’t even look at it, just stares sternly at Snape over her glasses.

(When they walk up the stairs to his office, Neville walks in the back, can almost feel Snape’s breath at the back of his neck. He expects him to grab him, reach out, just touch him but there’s nothing. He thinks he might cry.)

\--

Severus is so tired. 

There’s a huge disagreement about the punishment. The Carrows, well, it’s obvious what they want. They whine and moan about being strict, being firm and severe but are largely ignored. They want to keep them in school over Christmas break. They also want them to serve detention under them personally, which, they all know what that would mean.

He needs to tread carefully. Give the Carrows what they want, as close to what they want as he can, and keep Minerva and Filius from actively trying to undermine him. Keep the stupid children alive and with all their limbs. He can do it, he knows, but then there’s Neville. Sitting there, staring at him, the expression on his face going from angry to ashamed to rebellious and firm. 

He shouldn’t have associated himself with the boy in the first place. It’s his own fault. 

There’s also the question of the portkey. The Weasley girl knows he rummaged around in her head, but he doesn’t think she is aware that he knows about the portkey. That’s good. The Carrows don’t need to know. That is a more serious offence, could be reported to the Ministry, and the Carrows wouldn’t hesitate to do it. He doesn’t know what the Ministry does to minors these days, doesn’t care to know either. 

He gives them a month of detention. Maybe actually serving detention will keep them from stirring things up, will keep them busy. Hard to plan anything stupid when you’re spending every evening in the woods with Hagrid. He doesn’t let them know that now though, lets the Carrows think they’ll be in charge of detention, lets the kids think the same. He can deal with the Carrows later, and besides, a little fear is good for these thoughtless Gryffindors.

He sends them back to their beds after four, to be walked back to their dorm by their respective Heads of House, sends the Carrows out on patrol to make sure there is no more trouble. Really, he just wants them out of there so he can think.

He walks up to his quarters, sits on his bed and drinks what seems like half a bottle of whiskey and then takes out the portrait of Dumbledore, carefully unwraps the bedsheet he keeps it in. 

“Severus,” the portrait says agreeably and then, “I suppose this means bad news?”

“The Weasley girl tried to steal the sword,” he says, no reason to dally. 

“She did not succeed?” Albus asks, and Severus shakes his head. 

“No. I caught them and three others in the hall, with the fake sword. The Carrows were there.”

“Have you located Harry?” he asks, blue eyes focused.

“No,” Severus says. “Not yet. I will have to inform the Dark Lord-“

“Call him by his true name, Severus,” the old man interrupts. He ignores it.

“I will have to inform him, that the sword isn’t safe here. I will suggest it be moved to Bellatrix Lestrange’s vault.”

He doesn’t know how much Voldemort truly cares about the sword, only seems to understand the importance by Albus’ need for Potter to have it. Nonetheless, he would want to know. It’s a risk, moving it again, having more eyes on it. It is a near perfect fake but, still. 

He wants to tell him about Neville. It’s a familiar role with the two of them, him as the confessor and Albus as the benign patriarch always asking too much. There is only so much repentance left in Severus’ body.

“A fine plan,” Albus says. “Let him think all is under control.”

“I…” Severus starts. “I let the children go home over Christmas. They’ll have detention later. Hopefully the Carrows will calm down.”

“They are only Deputy Headmasters,” Albus says, “Voldemort put his trust in you for a reason.”

Deputy Headmaster is a made-up title, made for temporary Headmasters, if the regular one is made absent or dies. Severus is neither absent nor dead. ‘Trust’ doesn’t seem quite the right word. 

\--

On the train to King’s Cross three Death Eaters drag Luna off and disapparate. Neville is sitting in another carriage with some third years scared of the Death Eaters patrolling the train, and doesn’t hear about it until they’ve gotten off the train, until Seamus runs up to him, out of breath. Ginny apparently is still on the train, being detained for something or other. They wait anxiously on the platform, until, finally she appears, angry and shouting, followed by McGonagall and Hagrid. McGonagall keeps hissing at her to be quiet, that there’s nothing they can do, that she should try to be calm. When she sees her mother in the distance, waving at her, looking confused, she turns around and wipes her face, and when she turns back she’s smiling weakly. Neville is three hours late home and when he gets there his grandmother is sitting in the kitchen, listening to that radio station Lee Jordan started, her cup of tea cold. She cries when she hugs him.

Neville spends a quiet Christmas with his grandmother. She’d gotten a letter home from McGonagall about what they tried to do and when they eat Christmas dinner, just her and his uncle, the only one in their family living close enough to dare make the trip, she makes a toast to him, talks about how his parents would be proud. This is all it took, he thinks to himself. Neville only smiles weakly, goes to bed early. He stays in bed.

In January, Ginny and Seamus and he share a compartment on the Express and sit there quiet, looking out at the hills they roll past, the grey sky and the snow. 

“At least mum let me come back,” Ginny says. Neville remembers her red face, the angry tears as McGonagall held her still until the rest of the Death Eaters had moved off the platform, until her mother arrived and she tried to downplay it. “I don’t know what I would have done if she’d made me hide out at home.”

After a while of no response she says quietly, “Do you think it had anything to do with…”

“No,” Neville says, puts a hand on her knee. “It’s not our fault. They said on the radio it was because of her dad’s articles.”

“Luna knew what she was getting into, she knew the risks,” Seamus says, his feet tucked in beneath him on the seat. He doesn’t look at them. 

Ginny nods, steels her face into some expression that isn’t so open, vulnerable. 

They hardly talk for the rest of the trip and when they reach the castle, it too seems somehow quiet, muted. It might just be the snow. 

He wishes he could have stayed home. He doesn’t want Hogwarts to transform into this, into this horrible towering bad memory. 

Classes don’t start until the next morning and he takes a chance and goes to see Snape. He doubts he’ll welcome him but he has to try, doesn’t even really think about it when he sneaks off after dinner. He wants Snape to make him hurt until he doesn’t feel anything anymore.

Snape opens after the second knock, stands there in his dark robes, doesn’t look at all different. Tired, maybe. He doesn’t lock the door after he has let Neville in, a bad sign.

Neville can’t help glancing over to the glass case as soon as he gets through the door. The glass is repaired but the case is empty. He looks away. 

“Did you have a nice Christmas?” he asks, tries to smile. 

Snape says nothing, just stares him down. He’s leaning on the desk, hands on each side of himself.

“Did you need something?” he asks curtly, moves forward and around the desk, sits down in his chair. Neville doesn’t know what to do with himself, so just stands there looking stupid, awkward. 

“I…” Neville begins, decides to ignore the chill in Snape’s voice. “Yeah. I’m sorry.”

Is he? He’s sorry he apparently can’t get what he wants from Snape anymore. Not that he tried to do the right thing. 

“Did you enjoy playing double agent?” Snape asks, quiet.

“I didn’t,” Neville says. “I still wanted to be here, you know that.”

“When did you plant the portkey?” Snape asks, his hands clasped together on the table in front of him. He sounds calm, which isn’t at all what Neville wants. That’s right, the portkey. So Snape knows about it, and didn’t report it? That must be a good sign, that must mean something.

Neville shakes his head, looks at the floor. “It wasn’t like that.”

Snape raises his eyebrows. “Enlighten me, what is it like?” He’s using Neville’s words, mimicking him sarcastically.

Neville sighs. “We needed to do something, we-“

“No,” Snape interrupts, “I’m not interested in excuses.”

Neville feels so angry and lost. He doesn’t want to apologize again. It’s not his fault, and he meant to do it. He knew this would happen, had just been ignoring it. He doesn’t care that Snape is angry with him, he wants him to be, he wants him to hit him. 

No, not because Snape is disappointed for real. No, there’s a difference. He wants Snape to want to make him feel good. 

“I-I can make it up to you,” he spits out, can immediately feel himself blushing.

Snape smiles, lets out a noise, like an angry chuckle. “Oh? How would you do that? What could you possibly do?”

Neville walks around the desk, shuffles his feet nervously in front of Snape’s chair. He has swivelled to face him and is looking up at him like he knows what Neville is going to do and it amuses him. Neville feels frightened, feels somehow sad. 

He gets down on his knees, not touching Snape yet, just resting on his heels. “I’m sorry,” he says again, doesn’t mean it this time either. Snape says nothing, just sits there and waits.

Neville inches forward, puts one hand on Snape’s knee. Mostly it’s to keep it from shaking. The other one he drags through his hair, licks his lips nervously. He looks up at Snape now, before inching his hand up, clawing almost at the buttons on his trousers. He gets one of them open before Snape stands up, shoves him away. He walks away. 

“You’re pathetic.”

And Neville is left there looking at nothing, grabbing nothing, he has nothing. Luna is gone, is somewhere afraid and hurting and without them and there’s nothing he can do. They failed, the sword is gone somewhere too now, and Harry doesn’t have it. They couldn’t help. He can’t help anyone. Will they come and take Ginny next? Seamus? His grandmother? So far the Death Eaters have shown little interest in St. Mungo’s but if that changes, will he have to worry about his parents too? 

He wipes his face, but it doesn’t help, the warm, heavy tears just won’t stop coming. He just wants to not feel this way, why can’t Snape just let him have that? He leans forward onto his knees, clutches at the rug beneath him and tries to breathe. 

Snape is back now, grabs at his shirt, one that Ginny’s mother knitted for him. It’s blue, has a great big black ‘N’ on the front. It arrived in the mail on Christmas Day, carried by an ugly brown owl. With it was a card, thanking him for taking care of her daughter. As if. As if. 

Snape is saying something, getting him off the floor, shuffling him to the sofa. He sits down reluctantly, doesn’t want to be comfortable, wants to scream at him, throw things, cry. He feels like he’s crying so much there must be less of him now, this enormous hole must show somehow physically. 

“Calm down,” Snape says. 

“You-you don’t understand,” Neville snivels, feels pathetic, Snape was right. “I can’t do anything.”

Snape is grabbing his hands, trying to make Neville look at him, but he won’t. And then he leaves again, comes back with a cup of tea and makes Neville drink it, watches him. It’s not until he’s taken a few sips that he calms down enough to see that Snape is kneeling on the floor in front of him, helping him hold the hot cup. 

“I’m so sorry,” Neville says, feels like he’s going to start crying again. 

“There’s Calming Draught in it,” Snape mumbles. “Drink all of it.”

“I need to leave,” Neville says, and Snape pushes him down against the sofa pillows again.

“Drink it first, then you can do what you want.”

“I want-“ Neville starts but can’t finish. 

“I’m sorry,” Snape says. “Do you hear me?”

He has his hand on Neville’s cheek, making him watch him, keeping his head steady. It’s gentle. Neville nods, leans into his palm. He starts crying again. 

“They took Luna,” he gets out. 

“Yes, I know,” Snape says, sounds sorry. 

“Do you know where she is?” Neville asks. “What do they want her for?” 

‘They’. It should be ‘you’, shouldn’t it? 

“Her father wrote some things he shouldn’t have,” Snape says, weighing his words. Neville knows this already, it wasn’t what he was asking, not really. The question should have been more abstract. He knows they feel her father needs to be punished, he wants to know why someone would kidnap a sixteen-year-old, why someone would make her father spend Christmas alone, why someone would make Neville himself feel this way.

“Would you let them take me?” Neville asks, not even sure why. He’s not afraid they’ll take him, he doesn’t care if they take him. Maybe then he wouldn’t have to worry so god damn much about everyone else. 

“No,” Snape says, leans closer. “Of course I wouldn’t.”

Neville thinks about Snape catching them with the sword, how he was with Carrow, how he wouldn’t touch Neville afterwards. This might be a lie. It doesn’t matter, he doesn’t care. 

“Do you know where she is?” he asks, and Snape blinks slowly. He looks like he’s hesitating. Neville rewords it. “Can you tell me where she is?”

“You know I can’t,” Snape says. His eyelashes look pitch black against his skin. 

“Is she okay?” 

“Yes,” Snape says, nods. “Yes, she’ll be okay.”

“Are you lying?” 

“No, Neville, I’m not,” he says and Neville hugs him. He just slides down on the floor, feels his whole body give up, lets Snape’s body envelop him, swallow him whole. The tea, not very warm anymore, spills down the front of his shirt on his way down, the cup landing with a heavy thud on the rug.

“We couldn’t do it,” Neville mumbles into his shirt, crying again. “I’m just here and can’t help and can’t keep anyone safe and why, why can’t I ever do anything-“

“Stop talking,” Snape says, holds him first hesitantly and then so tight Neville thinks he might stop breathing. 

“I don’t know what to do, I-I want you to stop me from feeling like this, I don’t want to feel like this. Harry needed that sword, he can’t be out there alone, I-“

“He’s not alone,” Snape says into Neville’s hair. 

“I know, he’s got Ron, Hermione, but I, what if it’s not enough, I need to help, and now you won’t even touch me and I-“

“He has the sword,” Snape says, quietly. Neville snivels, finds to his horror that he has smeared snot and tears all over Snape’s robes. 

“What?” Neville asks and looks up at him. 

“I gave it to him,” Snape says. 

“What?” Neville asks again, stupidly. 

Snape strokes his hair, brings his hand down to his cheek, his jaw. “Sit up,” he says, pushes Neville back onto the sofa and joins him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i am very much a sucker for emotional drama! hope you enjoy it even though a lot of people make a lot of questionable decisions this chapter.


	7. Chapter Seven

Chapter Seven

He explains to him, slowly. About Phineas Nigellus’ portrait overhearing Granger, about talking to Albus’ portrait about what to do, about going to the woods, about how the sword they tried to steal is a fake. He can’t look at him as he does it. He is killing him. If Voldemort finds him, gets this information out of him, they are both dead. He’s being stupid, he’s being selfish.

It’s just that the boy looks miserable, says such miserable things. He snivels, cries into Severus’ shoulder. Says he can’t protect them, says he wants Severus to make him feel better. God.

There are things he keeps to himself, of course. At least. He doesn’t tell him what Albus told him about Potter, about the boy’s fate. Telling him that, would be… If the point is to make him happy, that wouldn’t be the thing to tell him. 

Neville stays quiet, has finally calmed down, with the help of some Calming Draught. His eyes are red and puffy and the whole of him seems watered down. Finally, he says, “Why would you talk to Dumbledore’s portrait?”

Severus thinks about what to say. It feels good to say it, now when he’s started talking he wants to say everything. This is different than under Veritaserum, isn’t about challenging the other one. This is about something else. “A long time ago I was in a bad place and Dumbledore helped me.”

“You killed him,” he deadpans. 

“He was dying. He asked me to. He’d rather it be me than Draco,” Severus says choppily, won’t look at him still. 

Neville shakes his head. “I don’t… You’re not a Death Eater?”

“I am,” he says, pulls up his sleeve and shows him the Dark Mark. “I was. I became one when I was too young to know better, and that had consequences. I still carry the mark, but I’ve been loyal to Albus for almost 20 years now, I still am.”

Neville stares at the Dark Mark, reaches out carefully to touch it. His fingers are warm and sticky, fingers blunt. 

“That’s… I don’t know. That sounds like something you’d say, to-to get me to feel better.”

“Too elaborate a lie,” Severus says, watches him closely. He doesn’t care if he feels better, he just doesn’t want him crying, he doesn’t want that in his office, on his conscience. 

Neville smiles at him. Like sunshine. 

\--

Neville isn’t stupid, he knows he might be lying. And even if it’s the truth, he knows there’s still no need for Snape to be so disgustingly mean. The reasons he hated him and was afraid of him when he was smaller aren’t gone, they’re still there in the back of his head. This doesn’t excuse anything. He’s still not a good man.

“You’re still an asshole,” is what he says, smiling, to Snape. Snape tells him that the same rules apply. They can’t ask about the war. There are apparently still things he’s not telling him. Neville doesn’t think he wants to know. 

He tries very hard not to let him get away with it, tries when Snape leans him back against the sofa, pushes at his shirt and mouths at his collarbone, down lower, his lips forming around a nipple. Neville pushes against him, wants him to know how good this feels, wants him to know that this is where he would like to stay, forever. 

What they’re doing now feels dangerous in a different way, seems like there’s more at stake. As Snape moves his mouth further down his abdomen, Neville wonders how long they’ve been doing this now. Two months? It has to be more than that? How do you measure the start of a thing like this? They haven’t had a first kiss, he hasn’t spent the night, they haven’t shared a meal.

And then Snape is moving his mouth over his dick, softly sucking, and he can’t think about anything else than what that feels like. Like his body is going to explode, no, like he’s going to melt into nothing, disappear. He feels like either there will be too much of him or too little, when Snape is finished with him. 

He comes quick, feels ashamed again. He thought he’d gotten better at waiting, at holding off. He’s gotten practise now, after all. 

Snape wipes his mouth and leans his forehead on Neville’s stomach, his hands still, his breathing calming down more and more each second.

Neville wants to say something, wants to thank him, wants him to know how much he likes this, how good it makes him feel. No, it’s not just the action he wants to tell him about, it’s him, his smell, his hands, his eyes. 

Instead he says, “Can I do something for you? Please, sir?”

Snape’s breath is warm against his stomach when he speaks. “No,” he says and Neville reaches out and touches him, runs his fingers through the dark stringy hair. “It was selfish of me to tell you.”

Neville shakes his head. “No. No, I feel better.”

“If you tell anyone, if anyone finds out. If you told anyone about us, if the Dark Lord found out and questioned you, we’d both be dead.”

“I’d never tell anyone,” Neville says. The word ‘us’ rings in his ears.

“I know,” Snape says, sounds miserable, and then looks up at him. “Not without incentive.”

“It’s my decision too,” Neville says and Snape looks grateful, sad. “I want this.”

“You don’t understand the consequences.”

“I understand. I’ve seen the consequences.”

After that, he says nothing and they stay like that, Snape leaning his weight on Neville, just breathing. Neville never wants to leave, but does in the end have to get back to his dorm, has to get some sleep. Snape writes him another note, but it doesn’t matter, Neville doesn’t see anyone in the halls anyway. 

When he gets back to his bed, he falls asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow, dreams about large dark clouds towering over him and the wind roaring. 

The next night he has detention with Hagrid in the Forbidden Forest, spends two hours after dinner gathering some sort of mushroom he needs for his garden. Neville’s fingers are red and chapped twenty minutes in from digging under the snow into the hard ground. Ginny talks about how they need to reschedule the DA meetings to the weekend when they don’t have detention, how they need to keep having them so everyone knows they’re still there. Hagrid pretends not to hear, tramples ahead of them to let them talk in peace.

“We won’t back down,” she says. “They need to know that.”

When he finally gets off, his hands are covered in dirt, his nails almost black and his legs feel like they’re going to give out from under him. He still goes to see Snape, has to, he feels like. He wants to see him, see that he’s still there. 

Neville can see he has arranged the chair in front of his desk, ready for him if he wants to. He offers him a drink when he steps in the door, and Neville sips it. It’s still the same old disgusting whiskey. 

It feels different now, like something has changed. Neville doesn’t feel as angry anymore. Is that good or bad? He wants to feel angry.

Outside the window there are dark clouds and heavy, thick snow is falling. It’d be almost pretty if he hadn’t just been outside in it, if his fingers weren’t still thawing.

Snape glances at his dirty fingernails.

“I had detention. We were in the woods,” Neville says, apologetically. Why apologetically? Who is Snape to criticise this, the man doesn’t seem to have washed his hair since he was Neville’s age.

Snape makes a small movement with his head. “No excuse for poor hygiene,” he says. Oh. Is this a game?

“I’m sorry, sir,” Neville tries. 

“Let me see,” Snape says, and Neville’s insides feel like jelly. 

“Yes, sir,” he says, puts his hands up, palms down, for Snape to inspect.

“Do you think I want to touch you when you’re filthy?” Snape says, dark eyes gleaming. Oh, it’s a game. “Answer me.”

“No,” Neville says breathlessly. 

“No, sir,” Snape says, glares at him.

Neville jumps slightly when Snape turns his hands around, drags his nails across his palm. “Sit down, put your hands on my desk. Palm up.”

Neville does as he’s told. His hands are outstretched, as if he is waiting to be given something, as if he’s surrendering.

“Good,” Snape says, his hand on his shoulder tightening slightly. Neville realises he has brought out the cane, pulled it out of thin air.

“Thank me for each stroke,” Snape says. “Say you’re going to do better.”

“Yes, sir,” Neville says and then Snape brings the cane down on his palms. It hurt so much Neville’s eyes tear up almost immediately. “Thank you, sir, I’m so sorry.”

Again. “I’ll do better, sir.”

Again. “Hn, I’m, I’m so sorry, thank you.”

\--

He can see his face from this position, see it contort with each strike. He wrinkles his nose up in a way that makes Severus want to hold him, want to touch him. He closes his eyes after a while, holds them closed hard. His eyelashes are wet. Two times he has to stop to tell him to keep his hands still, because he keeps twitching in between strikes, keeps fighting the urge to pull his hands away. It’s beautiful, that he fights. 

Afterwards, he puts his hands in a wrapping with Healing Potion, until the marks disappear completely. There won’t be any marks after this night, they can’t have that in a place as visible as his hands. 

“Does it still hurt?” Severus asks, carefully runs his fingers across his hands. 

“No,” Neville says, has a blank, happy look on his face. “It feels good.”

He rests his head against Severus’ chest and Severus feels proud. He can’t remember that he’s ever been this proud.

“Can I see where you sleep?” Neville asks, and Severus strokes his hair, takes maybe a moment too long to answer. “I know I can’t stay over, I just want to…” he trails off, sounds sleepy. 

“Yes, you can see,” Severus says. 

At this point he has given up. There’s no reason anymore to try to restrain himself. The boy knows all of it, wants this, knows the risks and the consequences. 

And then, suddenly, there is the familiar pain in his arm, the burning spreading, pounding. He looks down at the Dark Mark, at the arm wrapped around Neville. He doesn’t want to do this anymore. He feels so tired, he is so tired. He needs to fix his clothing, needs to prepare, needs to be alone and get the story straight. 

It’s been at least a month since his Dark Mark has hurt like this, since he’s summoned him. Severus thinks he’s been travelling in search of the Deathly Hallows, and he imagines the wild anger he will be met with now, from a man chasing a myth. 

“I have to go.”

Neville rubs his eyes with the back of his hand. “What? Why?”

Severus stands up, pushes him off, straightens his robes, buttons up. He tries to think, tries to think of the truth he is going to project into the outer edges of his mind. He can’t simply block out everything, can’t simply build a tall wall. He imagines it as several walls, each hiding an increasingly dangerous fact. The outer one must be sufficiently weak that the Dark Lord can tear it down, but not so weak as to make him suspicious. Behind that first wall he hides something shameful, or rude, or weak, or mildly disloyal. Something the Dark Lord would recognise as needing to be hidden. He thinks of the frustration over the Carrows, thinks about how inadequate he feels in this role, how he feels to see his colleagues dislike him as they do. Yes, that would work. 

Once, when he wasn’t so proficient in the field, he’d needed weekly practise, on how to empty his mind, how to project the things he wanted other to see. He’s not a young man anymore. He can do this. 

He needs discipline. Discipline works to avoid thinking of the things he absolutely cannot think about with the Dark Lord in his head. He knows discipline.

“What is it?” Neville asks again, looks alarmed now. Severus realises he’s been pacing as he straightens up. 

“I have to leave,” he says. “I’m sorry, he’s calling me.”

Neville looks confused for only a second, then his eyes widen, he scrambles to his feet and stands there looking lost.

“Are you going to be alright?” 

“I’m going to be fine,” Severus says, his mind elsewhere.

It’s not until he gets back after the meeting, tired and with his head splitting open with a headache that he realizes he’d kissed Neville’s cheek before the boy left. Almost chaste, the kind of absentminded kiss you’d give your spouse in the morning, before leaving for work. 

He sits in his empty bedroom, at four in the morning, and wishes he had company. No, he wishes for specific company, he wishes for Neville Longbottom. He sits and marinates in his headache until it gets too much for him and then chugs a glass of whiskey and a potion and falls asleep on top of the covers, with his clothes on. He sleeps restlessly and wakes up aching. 

The meeting had been a disaster. Not as bad as it could have been, he supposes. No one died. The Dark Lord is unhappy and frustrated, which, well, is good. Good in the long run, but it’s hard to keep the long run in mind when he’s under the Cruciatus curse until his head feels like it’s full of cotton and then knives.

Neville shows up at four, after his classes. His cheeks and nose are red and he has snow in his hair. He must have run from the greenhouse, through the snow and through the halls. Severus knows he has Herbology, knows his schedule almost by heart. Even when they had stopped, back in November, it was a comfort, knowing where he was, what he was doing. Severus can hear how it sounds unhealthy, how it sounds obsessive. It is. 

He smiles at him, pulls off his scarf and his mittens. “Are you okay?” he asks, as soon as Severus has closed the door.

“Did anyone see you? You shouldn’t come here this early,” Severus says, just to say it. He wants him here.

He laughs, “Oh, come on,” and then seriously, “People thinking you’re fucking me, is that really the biggest problem you could have?”

“Don’t talk like that,” Severus says as Neville fiddles with his clothes, runs his scarf through his hands, seemingly losing speed now.

“Are you alright, though?” he says seriously. Next he mumbles, “I was, um, worried,” and Severus wants to curl up in his lap, wants to go to sleep. He bets it would make his head feel better, bets it would make everything better.

He needs to stop this. Nothing like last night to remind him how much he needs the discipline, the routine. He can’t do this if he starts to feel like this, starts to feel at all. Wanting to fuck him is alright, slapping him, playing those games. Sure. That’s fine. He decides that’s fine. 

Discipline almost always means not getting what he wants.

“I’m fine,” Severus says, his head threatening to split open. “It was uneventful.”

Neville breathes out, “Oh, good.”

“You need to-“

“Yeah, I know I need to leave. I just wanted to see you,” he says and then looks out into the air as if he’s trying very hard not to make an ass of himself. “I mean, I wanted to see you were alright.”

Severus says nothing, and Neville takes a deep breath. 

“Okay. Yeah. Anyway,” he says, smiles. “I can come back on Saturday?” 

Severus wants to tell him to stay, that he’s right, it doesn’t matter. He tells himself again that this whole thing depends on rules. What he wants is irrelevant.

“Eight o’clock?”

Neville looks uncertain, uncomfortable. “Um, I can’t until later, I have a… thing.”

“You’re a horrible liar,” Severus says, wants terribly to look into his mind. 

“Not a lie, I do have a thing,” Neville says, 

“You’re not telling me everything.”

“I didn’t realize I had to,” he says, already half way to the door. 

“A date?” Severus asks, and Neville laughs, seems to find it extraordinarily funny. 

“No,” he says finally, putting his mittens back on. They’re bright yellow, don’t look store bought. Severus wonders what his favourite colour is, who made those for him. “Are you worried? Jealous?” he asks, still grinning.

“What then?” Severus asks, tries to be light. The thought of some other man touching him, some other boy, makes his skin crawl. A woman giving him something he can’t.

Neville shakes his head, his hand on the doorknob. “It’s not a date,” he says and then awkwardly looks at the door. “Is there an alarm this time, or?”

“No,” Severus says and, just to show he can let him leave, waves his hand with a silent spell and the door opens.

“Thanks, I’ll, I’ll see you Saturday,” Neville says. “Around ten.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter really ended up as a sort of intermission, containing a bit of fallout from the last chapter and not much else. I'm moving to a new apartment this week and might not have internet for a bit, but I'll make sure to get the next chapter up as soon as I can!
> 
> And some good news: I'm up to about 60 000 words on this story, and have lots of nice stuff in store for you!


	8. Chapter Eight

He keeps coming every weekend, some weekdays if he has the time or the strength after detention or wherever else he goes. He won’t tell him and Severus knows better than to ask. Graffiti keeps appearing all over the school walls, ‘The DA is still recruiting”, to the Carrows’ frustration. He knows that students disappear from their dorms from time to time, go to sleep somewhere else. He can guess what Neville does when he’s away, doesn’t need to know where exactly that is, it’s better he doesn’t know. It’s well into February by now, the classes have started up properly. Severus is getting more work, feels less useless. He’s only been called off to meetings two times, and none of them with the Dark Lord. Just the large, empty Malfoy manor. It feels good to have someone worry about him when he’s gone. A selfish feeling, but a good one.

They play the game with the Veritaserum again. Neville has asked him to do it several times, but Severus hasn’t wanted to, has felt too vulnerable. Or something like that. It’s been too much. He’s being good tonight, won’t ask personal questions, just asks him about silly things, nothing serious. He asks him about potions, about his work, what he likes about teaching. It’s almost too flattering. And then.

“Do you love me?” Neville asks, his face all smile, like he’s teasing, like he can say that and still pretend this is a game. 

Severus doesn’t smile. Doesn’t want to. Just looks down at his hands, feeling tired and ludicrously awake at the same time. When Severus doesn’t answer, Neville’s smile falters slightly and he starts to speak again. 

“What’s the problem?” he asks, cupping his mug in two hands, leaning his head to the left slightly. “Are you afraid you’re going to say yes or no? Both?”

Severus nods, doesn’t trust himself to open his mouth right now. The potion still tugs at something inside him desperately, wants him to open his mouth and let everything spill out, just keep talking for hours, tell him everything. They never should have done this.

Neville smiles again, and he’s so pretty. So young and happy and soft. 

“I can say it first if you like. Ask me,” he offers. When Severus stays quiet Neville’s eyes flit down to his drink quickly, hesitating just for a second or two, maybe realising he’s in over his stupid Gryffindor head. He starts talking despite Severus’ silence.

“I love you, I think. I haven’t really ever felt like this.” He lets go of the mug with one hand, which he now holds in front of his chest, as if holding something, as if cupping something gently. It’s a discrete move, something Severus wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t so used to watching this boy, how he moves, how his skin stretches and breaks, how his hands shake and gesture. “Sometimes when I look at you, when you do things that make me happy, it… hurts,” he says and on the word hurts he tightens the hand slightly, putting slight pressure onto something invisible, something too big really to fit into his seventeen-year-old palm.

“Yes,” Severus says quietly, agreeing. 

“I think that means… something,” he says, the hand relaxing back onto the mug, smiling slightly and very deliberately looking into Severus’ eyes. Severus feels warm, feverishly so.

“Yes,” Severus says and tries to let the tone of his voice, the heaviness of the word, relay what he wants Neville to know. Apparently this is enough both for the Veritaserum and for Neville. The tugging slowly stops, and Neville relaxes back against the pillows, stops moving so deliberately.

“It’s your turn.”

He considers asking him why, but reminds himself he is not a teenager, doesn’t need to know, doesn’t need his ego stroked like that. No, not that he has outgrown the need, just that he has grown out of asking for it. He seems to like the emotional questions. Severus wonders if that’s what his fault, if he should be more open, giving. Not that he can really change. 

“Do you think about me? When you’re not here?” Severus asks finally, something he’s been curious about.

Neville smiles at the question. “Of course I do,” he says, without hesitation. “That’s a yes or no question, want another one?” he says, and the look in his eyes tells Severus he’s well aware of where the game is heading now.

He takes his time with the next question, wants it to wipe away this nervous warmth settling heavily on his skin, on his chest. “Tell me what you think about. Come here and tell me.”

His legs fall open without him noticing almost and Neville carefully puts his mug down and stands up, moves slowly towards him. He pauses in front of him and Severus reaches out a hand, together they arrange themselves so that Neville straddles Severus’ lap, their bodies slotted together, Neville’s knees on either side of Severus’ hips. Severus puts his hands on the boy’s thighs, but keeps them still. 

“What was the question?” Neville asks, leaning down to rest his forehead against Severus’ chest, his clavicle. He can feel the warmth of him, even through his shirt.

“Look at me and tell me about the times you think about me,” Severus says, quietly. When he’s this close, when they’re pressed together like this, he can feel Neville’s hammering pulse, smell him. He smells sweet and heavy. When the boy doesn’t move Severus moves his hand up to his head, gently tugs at his hair to get him to straighten up, and says a little harder than before, “Pay attention, look at me.”

The blush that’s spreading across Neville’s face is so sweet that it makes Severus want to slap him. Maybe he tightens his grip on Neville’s hair too much, because he sucks in the smallest breath and says hurriedly, “Sorry,” and then, as if placating: “Sorry, sir.” 

It’s a gift. Neville is a gift, specifically for him. He can’t believe he’s this lucky, that somehow he deserves this. (He doesn’t, he knows he doesn’t, it doesn’t matter.)

He told himself he wouldn’t do this. What about the discipline? 

Neville looks him in the eyes and speaks again. “I think about you. Touching me. Your hands.” He’s trying to go slow but Severus can tell he wants to hurry through it. It embarrasses him. Fuck the discipline. “It’s good when you leave marks, because then I can, I can feel it. It’s like you’re there,” he says, and his eyes dart away from Severus’ eyes, down to his mouth, down to the hand he has placed on Severus’ chest. He fiddles with a button on Severus’ shirt.

“What do you like?” Severus says, and yes, he realises this is just another version of the question ‘why do you love me’. 

“I like that you’re bigger than me. I mean, um, you’re taller,” he mumbles. “You’re more of a… you’re a man, you know. I know I am too, it’s just, you’re… you’re strong. And powerful.”

Severus has been half-hard ever since Neville sat down on his lap, but now he’s so hard it almost hurts. 

His head is swimming. He means this. He can’t lie. He believes this. He realises he’s been squeezing Neville’s thigh and relaxes his hand, strokes over the fabric of his pants, trying to calm both of them.

“Do you touch yourself?” He didn’t realise he was capable of stringing together a sentence, but when he opens his mouth his voice sounds normal, if a bit rough around the edges.

The line is so cliché it’s almost funny, but Neville leans against his chest again, embarrassed. “Yeah,” he says simply, quietly.

Severus couldn’t stop himself even if he wanted to at this point, and lets his hands wander. He strokes up to where strong, young thighs become ass, and pulls Neville closer to him, cants his own hips up to meet him. They’re both hard, he can tell both through the hard warmth that now presses against his abdomen, and by the noise Neville makes right next to his ear. A sharp intake of breath, followed by a broken exhale. 

“I think about, about what it would be like if you fucked me,” Neville says into the crook of Severus’ neck. “I-I use my fingers and, and pretend it’s you.” 

He sounds so small and ashamed and it’s delicious. It’s wonderful. “You’re so lovely”, Severus says before he can even register he wants to say it. “You’re lovely,” he says again, and some part of his mind that’s disconnected from the rest of his body and what it’s feeling, registers how amazed he sounds, how naked. He has surprised himself, but Neville just makes a noise again, this one from deep in his throat, a noise that sounds content and nervous but not at all surprised. 

He untucks Neville’s shirt from his pants and runs his hands up Neville’s back, over smooth skin covering warm, relaxed muscles. He thinks about Neville, lying on his stomach, hands reaching behind him, pushing into that warm wet tightness with one finger, two. Rutting down into the mattress, leaking all over the bed. Severus’ name on his lips, Severus’ face in his head, his imaginary hands on his body. 

He pulls Neville back again by the sand coloured hair, probably too sharply, probably too rough, and then he kisses him. Holds him still with one hand and leans his head forward, meeting their lips. Neville has his eyes closed, and his lips are soft and wet and open. He’s a good kisser, gives in easily when Severus needs him to and pushes back when he’s told. He releases the grip on the back of Neville’s head and Neville takes this as permission to move, grinds his hips down and almost violently presses his mouth against Severus’, presses his entire body against his like he wants to hurt himself.

All of a sudden, they’re in a hurry. Severus gets his hand in between them and presses down on Neville’s erection, opens the fly, pulls him out.

“Wait, wait,” Neville gets out along with a low whine. “Wait,” he repeats, but doesn’t move away, and so Severus doesn’t stop. He moves his hand slowly and then quickly when Neville keeps whining, keeps moaning and clutching at him. He keeps the other hand on the small of Neville’s back, slides it down into his open pants and over the soft curve of his ass, squeezes.

Neville comes suddenly, splatters all over Severus’ shirt with a groan, his face scrunched up and his body tense. It’s the most beautiful thing.

He slumps back against Severus’ chest, breathing heavily, getting himself all dirty. “Thank you,” he says.

Severus would love to fuck him like this too. Relaxed, spent, sleepy. He could use his fingers and open him up and by the time he slides in Neville would be ready again, hard and awake and rutting against him. He has lube in the middle drawer in his desk, in an unlabelled bottle. He wants to so badly.

He feels Neville’s hand move now, between them, stretching down slowly. He has broad hands, made for outside work, for making things. He doesn’t make a sound when he reaches Severus’ dick, but stops, shapes his palm around it, experimentally presses down. 

He does make an ungentlemanly noise, he can admit it. Neville leans back and looks at him, finds what he needs in his face, Severus guesses, then looks down at his sticky shirt, down towards his trousers where Neville’s hand still squeezes. 

“Can I— can I,” he says and Severus interrupts him. 

“Yes,” he says, pushes Neville’s hand away, opens his pants and pushes them out of the way, in one movement it feels like.

And then Neville touches him and Severus feels like he’s going to explode. He hasn’t touched him like this before. It’s a thin but significant line they’ve crossed. Once, again, he has disappointed himself, shouldn’t do this. 

He stares down at where their bodies meet, sees the head of his dick disappear in Neville’s hand as it moves upward and then appear again, glistening and red, when he moves down. It’s a hesitant movement, but a strong grip. 

“Faster,” Severus says, and when Neville does as he’s told, leans his head against the back of the sofa, closes his eyes. “Fuck.”

“You can say it but I can’t?” Neville says with a smile in his voice, as if from very far away. “What a hypocrite.”

“Mm, yes,” Severus says, not really registering what he’s agreeing to. He’s already close, embarrassingly. He can feel his body tightening. He can also feel it when Neville stops smiling and leans in, moves faster and harder. He opens his eyes. “Say it again.”

“What?” Neville looks between his moving hand and Severus’ face, dazed. “That you’re a hypocrite?”

“Say you love me again.”

The grip falters only slightly and then Neville is leaning forward, his mouth to the exposed stretch of skin on Severus’ throat. “Yeah, mm, I love you,” he says. “I love you.”

And Severus pushes up a final time and comes all over Neville’s hand. 

\--

He doesn’t know what to do with his hand so he just wipes it on his own pants. They’re both messes anyway, it doesn’t really matter. 

He feels really happy. It surprises him, he thought he’d feel, well, something else, he’s not quite sure what. But he just feels happy. Not being able to touch him has been A Thing in his head for a long time. He’s wanted to. It’s a power trip, looking at him shake like that, breathe like that, knowing he’s the one that created those reactions. He can see how Snape likes it.

Snape has closed his eyes again, slumped back against the sofa. With one hand he’s putting himself back into his pants, straightening his clothes lazily. Neville won’t say he’s pretty, but he’s appealing. Like this, relaxed and sated, he looks appealing.

The enormity of what they’ve done, what he’s said, settles on them and Neville is so painfully aware of the quiet. He slides off Snape’s lap, pulls his legs up next to him on the sofa and watches him. He can still feel the heaviness of Snape’s dick in his hand, still feel it twitch. He wants to raise his hand to his face and see if he can still smell the stickiness but he realises that would be childish, he wouldn’t like that. Maybe he would, but Neville still wants to seem somewhat unfazed, somewhat experienced. 

They haven’t kissed before. He feels silly making the distinction between this and the other things they’ve done, but here he is anyway. He doesn’t know if it’s as big of a deal to Snape as it is to him, it probably isn’t. Snape kissed him on the cheek before, a strange, charming little habit he seems to have when he’s stressed or preoccupied or when he wants to calm Neville down. But that is nothing compared to this. Neville has only ever kissed two people. Three now, he supposes. Compared to this those times seem like nothing too. Snape tasted like whiskey and spit.

“Did you like it?” Neville asks and immediately feels a blush warming his cheeks. What a stupid, childish question.

Snape looks at him and seems to think the same thing. He still answers though, a delicate, “Yes, I did.”

He looks like he often does, like he wants to touch him but is stopping himself. Neville takes pity on him and grabs his hand, places it in his lap, keeps his eyes on it. “Do you think the Veritaserum has worn off?” he asks, desperate to change the subject now.

“I’d assume so,” he says and then more quietly, “How do you feel?”

“Fine, I mean, it feels like it has worn off,” Neville says and when Snape doesn’t answer he looks up to serious black eyes. Oh. A more adult way of asking. “I’m good. It was really good.”

Snape nods, sombrely. What do they do now? Neville wonders if he’ll let him sleep there tonight, finally. He doesn’t want to go back to the cold dorm and he doesn’t want to go back to the Room of Requirement either. It’s cramped and there are younger kids than him that need the real beds, he’d have to stay in one of the hammocks, or the sleeping bags.

“Can I sleep here tonight?”

Snape pulls his hand back. “That’s a bad idea.”

“I don’t want to get caught on the way back to the dorms,” Neville says, and adds, “It’s after curfew.”

Snape is, after all, the one who implemented the earlier curfew, maybe Neville wants him to feel a little bad about it. Students caught in the hallways after 8 o’clock not in the company of a prefect will be punished. It probably won’t be long until it’s just in the company of a Slytherin prefect, or one of those new Death Eater teachers. The others only have surface power anyway, a badge and not much more. But at least they have that. 

Snape bares his teeth. “We both know you have other places to go sleep.”

Neville shrugs. He hasn’t told him where the Room of Requirement is, or even that he doesn’t always sleep in his dorm, but Snape has guessed anyway. The Fat Lady has started refusing to let the Carrow siblings in for their midnight searches, so there’s really nothing to worry about anymore. Unless they follow him of course, but he’s careful.

“Would you rather I risk detention than sleep here? There won’t be a problem, I’ll leave in the morning before class.”

“Do not try to make me feel sorry for you,” Snape says. They’re apparently not playing anymore. 

He wonders if Snape would pull away if he’d try to kiss him now. He almost wants to try, so he can get angry. The anger he can deal with, the other things he feels too, except for this nervousness that just is useless and confusing.

“Can I take a shower? You can join me?” he asks, and it sounds like a line, even before he says it he can tell Snape won’t take him up on it. “Please,” he says anyway.

“A bad idea,” Snape repeats. “I know you’re trying to push me but please do not overestimate your own appeal.”

Neville laughs. “Okay. Alright. You know what, I can shower somewhere else.”

He gets up, angry now. This time though it settles sideways, feels wrong. As he gathers up his things Snape leans forward first, and then hesitantly stands up, reaches out a hand. He must feel it too, that this is a different anger, mixed with disappointment, contempt. He’s so very bad at apologizing, being tender. He can do it, Neville knows he can do it, has seen it in the way he touches him, the things he says and doesn’t. But then other times he’s so helplessly wrong and acts so stubbornly it makes Neville want to choke him. He wonders more often than he should what happened to him to make him this closed, this content with unfeeling.

“You know you can’t,” Snape says now.

Neville stands up straight, wants him so badly to understand. “There are a lot of things we can’t do that we do anyway. Don’t blame it on that.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt because I couldn’t stand an empty bed,” Snape says, after a long silence and when Neville turns to look at him he looks hard, closed off. 

“Yeah, fine, whatever.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is actually the first scene I wrote of this story and then I went back and tried to make it fit into some sort of story! hope you liked it, even though Snape is a stubborn asshole and they're both idiots


	9. Chapter Nine

Neville goes back and sleeps in his dorm, just to be able to shower. The Room of Requirement would have been better, livelier. Seamus hardly ever sleeps in the dorm anymore, just shows up to shower and make an appearance, so usually it’s just Neville. He stays there for the rest of the kids, the ones that don’t want to leave or stop their routines. Not everyone can join the DA, and Neville can understand that too. He’s there for them when they get scared in the middle of the night, the younger kids, and don’t want to be alone. It makes him happy to see them crawl into one of the empty beds next to Neville’s and be able to sleep easier.

It’s nice, but the Room of Requirement is something very different. It’s not just a meeting place, it’s a symbol for the community they have created together. Where people can go when they want to learn to defend themselves, or study or just not be alone. It’s beautiful.

When he gets there tonight though, Seamus is there, seems to be waiting for him. He’s sitting on Neville’s bed, his hands in his lap.

“Did you listen to the radio today?” he asks, quiet. He’s fiddling with the stuffed toy Neville keeps on his bed, the owl. Neville’s stomach drops.

“No, I didn’t.”

He carefully sits down next to Seamus on the bed, on top of the covers. He feels like he has to talk quietly, like Seamus is going to be scared. He doesn’t want him to start crying, doesn’t think he could take that right now.

“They found an unidentified muggleborn dead in Bristol,” Dean says. “They described him and, and it sounded just like him, Neville. Dean has relatives in Bristol.”

“Oh,” Neville says. “I’m sure it’s not him. It’s a big city, Seamus.”

“How can I know though?”

Neville wonders, not for the first time, if Dean and Seamus were together. Neither of them ever talked about it, he doesn’t have anything to back it up, except for how distraught Seamus has been ever since he went on the run.

“I shouldn’t have come back to Hogwarts,” Seamus says now. “I should have gone with him.”

“We need you here,” Neville says. “You do good work here. I can’t promise you he’s okay, but-“

“I know,” Seamus says, carefully puts the toy down. “Yeah, I know.”

“Are you okay?” Neville asks, puts his hand on Seamus’ back. Seamus chuckles, sounds sad and broken. Who isn’t. 

“You don’t have to look at me like that,” he says, leans into Neville’s hand, his arm. “I’m not gonna do anything stupid. I’m just sad.”

“Yeah, me too,” Neville says, smiles weakly at him. 

Seamus leans into him, presses his mouth against Neville’s and then leans back again. It’s slow, without feeling, and feels just as sad as Seamus looks. 

Neville doesn’t know what to say, so he just lets out a slow, “Seamus…”

“Sorry,” Seamus says quietly, smiles. “I said I wasn’t gonna do anything stupid, and then I… It’s not even about you, I’m just feeling down. I know you’re seeing someone, I just… I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“What?” Neville says, frozen.

Seamus chuckles again, sounds like he might cry. “What do you mean? You are, right?”

“How… why would you think that?”

“Come on, Neville. We share the same bathroom, I’ve seen the marks,” Seamus says, as Neville moves further and further away from him on the bed. “I can hear you when you get back late.”

“Look, Seamus, I-“ Neville starts, needs to bury this. Oh God. He didn’t think he’d be this scared, but he’s almost shaking.

What would happen if Seamus told someone? Like McGonagall? She couldn’t get Snape fired, could she? Snape is working directly under Voldemort, right? Would he get in trouble with Voldemort? What if Neville caught his eye, because of this, made him pay attention to Neville? And then read his mind, found out what Snape told him? Oh no. 

“Hey, I’m not gonna tell anyone!” Seamus says. “You don’t have to look so freaked. It’s your business, right?”

Neville knows he must look terrified. He can handle his fear better than he can hide it.

“Please don’t,” he says, lets out a laugh that seems to shake his whole body.

“No worries. As long as you don’t tell anyone about this whole thing,” Seamus says, gestures between them. 

“No one would believe me, you’re way out of my league,” Neville says, which gets a huff of laughter from Seamus. 

“So, you wanna play some chess?” Seamus asks, and Neville shakily gets up from the bed. 

“Yeah, sure. Just gonna take a shower,” he says, tries to smile. 

After a game of chess, the tension disappears. When they go to sleep, Neville lies awake and listens to Seamus’ breathing, and thinks panicked thoughts about Snape being caught, that turn into panicked dreams. He wakes up covered in sweat, feeling more tired than when he went to bed.

Neville doesn’t want to tell Snape about what Seamus told him, or what he did. He guesses he has to though. It feels like it would ruin it, make it less intimate, and last time was so good. Part of the charm is that it’s a secret. He waits until Wednesday after detention, can’t keep running to Snape every time he feels lost or worried. He’s stronger than that. 

When Snape lets him into his office, there’s no fire in the fireplace, no lights on, and Neville’s panic immediately flares up. Does he already know?

“What’s this?” Neville asks, and Snape looks, nervous, is what that expression would be called on anyone else.

“I wanted to apologize for last time,” he says, keeps his dark eyes on his hands. He looks stubbornly unmoved. “I thought you might like to come upstairs instead.”

Neville can’t help smiling. “Sure,” he says, walks closer. He puts one of his hands on Snape’s chest. The fabric is stiff, like he just cleaned it. When Neville touches him his head falls forward slowly, all the tension goes out of him. “I’ve never seen where the Headmaster sleeps,” he says, maybe too forward. But Snape does nothing, just leans into him. 

“After you,” Snape says, reaches his hand out to the staircase in the corner of the room, and then follows Neville as he climbs it. There’s a door that swings open, and then a hallway and another door. It seems too big for the tower, for the space it has to sprawl out inside, but then of course it would be. 

The second door opens up into what seems to be a small kitchen and a living room combined in a round room. It’s not big. There are a few other doors, all but one closed. Neville can see a bed through it, windows with dark curtains drawn. Up here it’s warm, a fire lit and lights on. 

The rooms are sparsely furnished, a sofa, a fireplace and some kitchen cabinets. It’s not what Neville expected but it fits strangely anyway, into his view of Snape. It’s tidy, but on the kitchen table there are papers strewn, bottles of potions. On the walls there are bookcases with rows and rows of books, and they’re stacked up on the floor as well. There are dishes in the sink, mostly cups with coffee stains. 

Neville isn’t unaware of what this means, but to take that in right now feels like it might break him, fill him up until he pops.

“It’s adaptive,” he says. “It changes appearance, number of rooms, after the needs of each holder of the title.”

“Why’s that?” Neville asks, walks carefully around the sofa, tries to memorize as many details as he can about the place. He doesn’t know when he’ll be back after all. 

“Extra rooms for spouses, or children,” Snape says. He hasn’t moved from the door. “I have neither.”

“What are your rooms for then?” Neville asks, turns around. 

“You’re standing in the kitchen. Bathroom,” Snape starts, gestures to the closed doors. “Potions room, study, bedroom. Balcony.”

“You have a balcony?” Neville smiles, notices the glass door. “Wow. Sure are some nice perks to the job.”

Snape doesn’t smile. “Do you want something to drink?” he asks, as Neville sits down at the dining table, starts to take off his outer layer, the whole school outfit feels wrong here, right now.

“No, I’m good.”

Snape moves to a cabinet in the kitchen, takes out a bottle of something alcoholic and pours a glass for himself. Then he takes off his robes, hangs them over a chair and sits down. He’s in just his shirt and trousers now, as dark as the rest of his clothes. 

“I… I, um,” Neville starts. He needs to say it, can’t let them do anything before he has, it would be dishonest. 

“What?” Snape says, leans back in his chair. He look so good that Neville thinks he might be crazy. He hasn’t looked this good before, has he? He looks powerful, adult. 

“Seamus kissed me, and he knows I’m seeing someone,” he says all at once, like ripping off a bandaid. 

Snape says nothing, takes a sip of his glass. “How does he know? Did you tell him?”

“No, of course not,” Neville says, tired of Snape not trusting him. “I said I wouldn’t do that.”

“How does he know?” Snape says again, enunciates each word angrily. He’s still not moving, just lifts his glass to his mouth again. 

“It’s not that hard to figure out. We live together, I come back at strange hours, have, um, marks,” Neville mumbles. He hopes he hasn’t created trouble for Seamus. He doesn’t need it.

Snape raises his eyebrows, swivels his drink around. “Right. You live together,” he says, like he’s making fun of him. “Was that all you did, kiss?”

Neville is almost speechless. “How can you be mad about that?” he asks. No, of course he’s mad, the old snide asshole.

Snape grimaces, looks down into his glass. “I don’t have a right to be mad?”

“No, you don’t,” Neville says, louder now, almost angry. “He kissed me because his boyfriend’s missing and he was upset. I wouldn’t have done anything else.”

It’s definitely jumping to conclusions, calling them boyfriends, but whatever. The whole scene feels so dramatic that any other word would be too small. When Snape keeps up his stubborn, angry silence, Neville looks down at the table, traces the cracks in the wood. 

“You know I-“ he starts and then, “You know how I feel. If that’s not enough to get you to trust me then maybe I should leave.”

Snape won’t look at him, continues sulking. His stomach drops. “I didn’t do anything wrong,” Neville says quietly, gets no reaction. “Okay, fine, be an asshole.” He gets up, pulls his clothes up from where he’s slung them on the table. 

As he passes Snape, he feels the man’s hand on his arm. “Don’t,” he says. He squeezes. 

Neville looks out into the empty room. Patience. He knows what Snape can be if he lets him. Damn it. He doesn’t say anything, and Snape keeps his hand where he placed it. 

“I don’t want anyone else to touch you,” he says, quietly, his lips barely moving. 

Neville melts. Damn it. He sits down again, keeps his things in his lap. 

“That’s my decision,” Neville says. “You know I’ve chosen to be here.”

Snape still won’t look at him, nods into his drink. 

They sit in the silence for a while, until Neville looks up at him. He looks so defeated.

“I need to use the bathroom,” Neville says. It’s not a discrete way to escape the situation, and Snape probably knows this. One of the doors creak open. “Thank you.”

Neville locks the door behind him, and then stands there, leans against the door. It went better than he expected, all in all. 

The room has a large bathtub, big enough for at least four people, Neville guesses. Brown tile, a basin and a toilet. There is a large mirror that covers almost an entire wall. 

He stares at himself in the mirror for longer than necessary. He looks tired, has dirt in his hair, is slouching. At least this time he stopped by the dorm to wash up before he came here. His hair has grown too long, but he doesn’t have the energy to do anything about it. He should ask Ginny to trim it for him, she knows a good spell for that. Otherwise he looks like he’s always looked. A pale pink, all of him, more round edges than hard. He hopes it’s good enough.

Snape is still sitting at the table, when Neville steps out, his now empty glass in front of him. He’s reading some of the papers scattered on the table, not with much interest it seems. He looks up when he sees Neville come out of the bathroom. Okay, so now he’s going to try to be brave.

“Can you give me a tour?” Neville asks, tries not to sound so nervous, doesn’t know if he succeeds. Snape looks like he wants to say something snide, so Neville interrupts. “Like, the bedroom?”

Neville doesn’t wait for permission, but stalks over to the open door, glances in. 

“This is it, right?” he asks, Snape still being quiet. “You don’t have to look so worried, I’m not going to mess with your stuff.”

“I’m not worried,” Snape says, follows him in through the door.

Inside, there is a large four-poster bed and on one side of it there is a nightstand, books stacked there too. Neville pulls the curtains aside slightly, finds there are large windows from roof to floor that look out over the school grounds. In the distance, over the pointed rooftops, he can barely make out the dark Quidditch field, and then beyond that the shadows of the trees in the Forbidden Forest. He lets the curtain go, looks over at Snape where he stands in the doorway. He sits down on the bed, tries to smile. 

“Is this where you sleep, then?” he asks, looks over to the pillows. The mattress is hard but the sheets are soft and smooth. He runs his hand over them. 

“Yes,” Snape says.

“Which side?” Neville asks, can hear himself start to ramble. “Or I don’t know, you might-“

“Do you know what you’re doing?” Snape asks, but it doesn’t seem like it’s a question. 

He’s standing over him now, one hand on one of the columns, leaning over him. Neville shakes his head. 

“You’re a reckless, rash boy,” Snape says, puts his hand on Neville’s cheek. “What were you hoping to achieve here?”

“I want you to touch me,” Neville says, bites his lip. He knows how desperate this sounds, but by the look of Snape’s tightly pressed together lips, he likes it.

“Oh?” Snape says, his voice level.

“I only want you to touch me,” Neville says, turns so that his mouth is against Snape’s palm. He smells heavy, like lavender, surprisingly masculine. “Only you.”

Snape lets one of his fingers run over his lips, and when Neville opens his mouth he slides it in. His finger feels heavy and large on his tongue. Neville runs his finger over it, and Snape opens his mouth, just a millimetre. 

His crotch is at eye level and by the way his pants are tented, Neville thinks he more than likes it. He can’t help grinning. This is because of him. 

Neville leans forward, steadies himself with one hand on Snape’s thigh. He can feel the muscles in his leg twitch as he leans forward even more, puts his mouth on the shape in Snape’s trousers. 

Then he pulls him back, his hand clutching at the back of Neville’s head. 

“Did I tell you you could do that?” he says, his voice still calm. He tightens the hand in Neville’s hair, so much that Neville has to bend his head back. 

“No, sir,” he says. 

“Open your mouth,” Snape says, and the look of his eyes is like someone watching a wild animal move closer. Apprehensive, forced calm. 

Neville opens his mouth and Snape lets go of the column to slide two fingers into his mouth. When he takes them out again they’re wet and glistening and Snape looks at them as if he can’t imagine how they got to be that way. 

“Please?” Neville says, doesn’t know exactly what he’s asking for. 

“What do you want?” Snape asks, still quiet. “Ask for it.”

“Please, can I-“ Neville begins. Snape runs his wet fingers across his face, over his cheek. “Can I suck you off, please?”

Snape’s nails scratch at his scalp, and with the other one he opens the buttons on his trousers. Neville continues talking, when Snape pulls himself out, tugs on his dick, two, three times. 

“I want you,” Neville says. “Please. Sir.”

Snape lets out a noise, like a groan but more breathless, more strangled. And then he pushes the tip of his dick over Neville’s lips, the other hand on the back of Neville’s head, holding him steady. Neville’s mouth feels so full that it’s going to burst. He has a hard time knowing what to do with his teeth, his tongue. He tries sucking gently and can feel Snape hiss out a sharp breath. 

It’s hard to breathe, and when Snape pulls his head back and off him he sucks in a deep breath, wipes his mouth. He’s been drooling. 

“Breathe through your nose,” Snape says and Neville nods, looks up at him stupidly. “Give me your hand.”

He takes Neville’s hand, guides it onto the base of his dick. Neville squeezes experimentally, then strokes slowly. 

“Mm, yes,” Snape says, pulls the word out like it’s several syllables long. “Use your hands and your mouth. Your own pace.”

As Neville tries a lick, Snape puts his hand back on the column and makes a noise deep in his throat. He closes his lips around it, tries to swallow down the spit but finds that he can’t. He wants to laugh. 

It takes him a while to find a good rhythm, to figure out what makes Snape moan or clench the column so hard his knuckles go white. He does it in the end though, uses his tongue to swipe up from the base to the tip, tightens his lips and sucks, squeezes with his hand.

Snape is breathing heavily, his face buried in the crook of his arm. Neville can only see his mouth, slightly open and panting, when he says, “Oh, that’s good, you’re so good.”

He swipes his tongue beneath the head, and then over the slit and Snape gives out a strangled cry, his hips twitching forward. 

“I’m going to finish,” Snape says breathlessly, and then, “Oh, God.”

Neville pulls away, doesn’t really know what to do now, but his hand keeps moving, slides with the spit and then Snape comes, leans forward into him and comes in stripes across Neville’s face. In his hand, he can feel Snape’s heartbeat.

He lets Neville go, his chest heaving. “Jesus,” he says, wipes his face on his sleeve. 

Neville laughs again, pushes the white liquid into his mouth with two fingers, tastes it. It’s not unpleasant. Salty.

Snape pushes off from the bedframe, sits down next to him and breathes, puts himself back in order. 

“Was that good?” Neville asks, and Snape doesn’t answer him, just wipes his face again, looks off into the distance. 

When he finally looks at him, he says only, “Stay here.”

He gets up and comes back with a towel, holds Neville’s head still and wipes him clean. Then he kisses him, still with one strong hand on his jaw. 

“Was it? Good?” Neville asks, afterward, when Snape has let him go. 

“Lovely,” he answers, strokes across Neville’s cheek, down to his jaw and his neck.

Neville smiles. “Good.”

“Take your shirt off,” he then says, looks down to Neville’s chest. “Then lie on the bed.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked it! thank you for all the nice comments!


	10. Chapter Ten

Severus watches him lie down, support himself on his elbows and look up at him. He looks uncertain. 

“Trousers as well.” Now that he sees him lie there, he changes his mind. He wants as much skin as possible. 

Neville does as he’s told, fumbles with the buttons and then slides his trousers off. Severus takes them from him, puts them on the chair in the corner, and then looks at him. 

He’s pale, with long sturdy legs and a long torso. In this light he looks almost hairless but as Severus moves closer, he can see the pale, pale hair dusting over his legs and growing sparsely across his chest. He can’t only see it, he can feel it. He runs his hand up his leg, up his side. The boy smiles at him.

The sweetness of that blowjob. Severus doesn’t think he’s ever had a blowjob that sweet before. His mouth feels like he has actually filled it with sugar, his tongue feels heavy and his spit too thick to swallow. Syrupy, sickly, almost. The way he had hesitated and then given Severus everything he had, that’s what leaves that taste in his mouth.

“Arms over your head.”

“Are you going to tie me up?” he asks, sounds only excited. 

“Do what I say,” Severus says and he does. He always does.

He reaches over to his nightstand, grabs his wand and watches the boy’s face open up as the ropes appear out of nowhere and tighten around his wrists, binding them to the bedframe. 

“Is it too tight?” he asks, and Neville shakes his head. 

Alright. He positions himself on his knees between Neville’s legs, the boy’s thighs leaning against his own. The position reminds him of praying. For what? To whom? Maybe this is repentance? Severus can live with that.

Again he runs his free hand up Neville’s side, watching as he squirms and tries to hold back a grin. 

“It tickles.”

“Can you hold still?” he asks and Neville opens his mouth, lets out a breath, and then nods. “Good.”

He brings his wand up, puts it to his chest and says a quiet incantation. He starts squirming almost immediately. 

“No,” Severus says, stops. 

“It’s too warm,” Neville says, tries to push away but the ties won’t let him. 

“You can take it,” Severus says. When he puts the tip of his wand back to his chest and pulls it downward, it actually creates a red line going from just below one nipple to his hip. Neville makes a pained noise but doesn’t squirm. Oh, he’ll squirm. 

He pulls it back up, without the heat now, and circles one nipple, watches him tense up in anticipation. He changes the heat to chill instead, and now he jumps, his body telling him it’s incredible heat again. 

“Oh, oh,” he lets out, and Severus smiles. 

“Stay still,” he says, pulls the wand downward again, heat now. He pushes his thigh out, moves both his hand and his wand to the inside of his thigh, cold now. He tries to pull away but Severus holds him in place. “Don’t squirm, didn’t I say that?” When he doesn’t answer, occupied with following the wand tip with his eyes, he repeats. “Didn’t I?”

“Yes, yes, I’m sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?”

“For squirming, I’m so sorry, oh, no please don’t.”

Severus has brought his wand the furthest up his inner thigh as he can, and revels in the begging. He increases the heat only slightly, watching the skin redden more and more. He keeps it there still, watches as Neville starts to squirm. 

“You have a lot to apologize for,” he says. 

“Hnn, I know, yeah, please,” Neville says. “What, what- tell me what to apologize for.”

“You know what you should be sorry for,” Severus says, shifts slightly. “Letting someone else touch you.”

“Ah, ah, it hurts, please,” Neville says and Severus lifts the wand, brings it up to just below his navel instead. There is a round, pink mark now, on the inside of his thigh. Neville breathes out in relief for just a second, until he feels the pain against the soft skin again. 

“Are you sorry?”

“Mmm, yes, I’m sorry.”

“What are you sorry for?” Severus wants him to say it. This is playing dirty, he knows it. 

“Ah, ah.”

He’s making little circles now, with his wand. 

“I’m sorry for letting him kiss me. Ah, ah.” He squirms, manages to get away from the heat for a moment until it’s there again. “I’m so sorry.”

“Will you do it again?” he asks, holds him steady now with a hand on his hip. 

“No, never,” he says. He’s tearing up now. “No one else, just you.”

“Who do you belong to?”

“You, to you,” he says, rambling now. Severus takes the wand away. He wants to ask him to say it again, tell him what he feels for him. He won’t. They haven’t talked about it since that night in his office, and now it would feel greedy, or weak. But what is this thing about then, other than for greed or weakness? He means both sex and love now, both specifically the two of them and in general. Has it ever been about something other than that?

“Yes,” he says, puts the wand on the bed next to him. He kisses him, a wet, teary kiss. His face is red, his eyelashes wet. Severus kisses at the wet trails of tears on his cheeks. “You’re all mine,” he tells him, slightly deliriously, as Neville breathes harshly through the tears. “It’s over now, you were so good.”

Severus moves down his body, presses a kiss to the marks, closes his mouth around a nipple. The crying stops soon enough, is replaced with more begging. He slips the underwear off and takes a second to look at him, admire what he’s done.

The lines of his body are soft now, where they’d been tight and tense before. He lies propped up against Severus’ pillows, stark white skin against dark grey sheets. He runs his hands up his sides again, followed by his mouth, his face. He runs his cheek against his stomach, leans his head against his chest, feels the soft hair on his lips and chin. A lovely thing to pray to. 

He looks spent, smiles softly, his eyes barely open. When Severus takes his hard dick in his hand, he gasps, and as Severus works he alternates squeezing his eyes shut and staring up at the ceiling, his pupils blown wide. When he comes, Severus releases a breath along with him, can feel himself leaning into him, releasing tension along with him. 

He lets him out of the restraints, holds his arms so he won’t hurt himself and eases him down. 

He strokes over the boy’s forehead, strokes the soft hair out of the way, until he looks at him and sees something, until he’s come back to the present.

“That was good,” he says, smiles. He tries to prop himself up on his elbows again, but gives up when he keeps shaking. 

“Are you cold?” Severus asks, and doesn’t wait for a response, manoeuvres him so that he’s lying wrapped in the sheets instead of on top of them. 

“I’m just tired,” he says, sits up slightly to lean against the headboard. 

Severus excuses himself to wash his hands and when he returns, Neville has fallen asleep. He stands there for a second, watches him breathe heavily and then walks out, closes the door. 

Severus has never been too much for touching this much, kissing this much. He likes using his mouth, he likes touching, but it’s always been for a different purpose. He’s always been in control of it, used it to entice reactions, to inspire loyalty or submission. The way he touches Neville, he can admit now, is to make him feel good, to give him what he wants. There is a pleasant amplification of that separation from his own body that he sometimes experiences during sex, a focus on another partner. He feels more with Neville than he does himself. He’s never wanted this so much before. Not just the sex, but afterward. He’s always limited himself to whatever aftercare etiquette demanded of him and then left, but now he wants this.

It's startling, almost frightening. A newfound tenderness.

\--

Neville wakes up alone, naked. It’s not as scary as it sounds, surprisingly enough. It takes him a moment to figure out where he is, but there’s no nervousness, no spike in anxiety. 

When he remembers what they did, where he is, he falls back against the pillows and smiles to himself. 

His clothes are folded on the chair in the corner and he stumbles out of the bed and pulls them on. He feels soft and relaxed. Happy. 

He opens the door a crack. No Snape. He searches through the place, feeling like an intruder, and finds him in the potions room, a spacious room filled floor to ceiling with bookcases of bottles and boxes of what Neville assumes are ingredients. Snape is standing behind a large table, cutting something up. He looks intense. 

Again Neville feels this incredible… honour? Something like honour or pride that this man would choose him, that he gets to be here. 

“Hey,” he says, and Snape doesn’t look up. 

“Did you sleep well?” he asks, putting the chopping board away, wiping his hands. 

Neville lets out a small laugh. “Yeah. Thanks for… letting me, um…” he trails off. “What are you doing?”

Snape raises his eyebrows. 

“Well, yeah, okay. Making potions, I guess,” Neville mumbles and then there’s silence. “What time is it? Should I, um, leave?”

Just when Neville thinks he won’t answer, Snape looks up and says, “It’s an antidote. General antidote.”

Neville walks closer, slowly. “Oh?”

“While I may not be the most hated headmaster in Hogwarts’ history, the idea of making a general antidote isn’t… a bad one,” Snape says and finishes clearing his work space. 

Neville nods to himself, fiddles with the sleeves of his shirt. He remembers what he told Snape, no, what he shouted at Snape, all that time ago. He doesn’t regret it, but it doesn’t make for pleasant conversation. Snape is the one who talks first, again. “You can stay if you’d like. I’m finished here for now.”

Neville can’t help smiling as Snape strides over to him, walks past him and into the kitchen. “Yeah,” he mumbles to himself and the now empty room, grinning. 

He follows him out into the larger room, stands there and watches Snape as he washes his hands in the kitchen sink. 

“Are you hungry?” Snape asks and Neville almost doesn’t know what to say. It’s sweet. 

“Yeah,” he says again. “I mean, if you… Don’t go to any trouble, or anything.”

This is the most awkward conversation Neville has had, but he loves it. 

Snape nods, waves his hand and bread appears from a cupboard, some cheese, butter. As it starts arranging itself into a sandwich, Snape starts to warm some water, for tea. 

Neville edges closer, as Snape continues to ignore him, then leans against the kitchen counter, watches him work. 

“Stop smiling,” Snape says without looking up and Neville just smiles wider, turns his head away to hide it. 

\--

Things are good. They get contact with the Order of the Phoenix, work together to make things easier for everyone. He and Ginny continue to hold DA meetings, more people joining every day. Ginny’s mother doesn’t seem to happy hearing about the training they’re doing, but they make a conscious decision not to go into details.

Things with Snape are good too. He invites him up to his quarters more often than not. This anxiety cloud he’s been living in feels not so heavy. 

He lies in Snape’s bed one evening, thinks about it. Snape is off somewhere, washing his hands, and even this loose presence of hearing him in another room, it makes sense somehow. Feels comforting. They don’t really talk about it but Neville thinks Snape feels the same way. That’s almost the part that makes him the happiest. He thinks about the other night, when Snape had pushed him down face first into the mattress, used his mouth and his tongue and his fingers and then afterwards, they’d sat in the sofa in the living room, just in silence, and Snape had leaned over, brushed his hair out of his face. It’s mind boggling how good he can be when he tries. 

Now, lying in bed, Snape returns, a towel in his hand. He wipes the mess they’ve made off of Neville, taking his time. 

“Can I take a shower?” Neville asks and then, more boldly. “Or do you want to take a bath? With me?”

Snape doesn’t speak for a moment, just continues drying him off. And then, “If you want to.”

Neville props himself up on his elbows, pushes Snape’s hands away. “Yeah. Let’s do it.”

They make their way over to the bathroom, with its spacious bathtub and dark green tile. He’s never been in a bathroom this big, not that he can remember anyway. His grandmother’s house has only a shower, while this one has both, and a large window in the ceiling, where Neville can see the stars. It’s not that he and his grandmother are poor, certainly not, but his grandmother has a strict ‘no fanciness’ thing, and this is certainly fancy. 

As Snape waves his wand to make the bathtub fill up, and then starts to undress, Neville is very, very aware that he hasn’t seen Snape completely naked yet.

Neville sits down on the side of the tub and watches him as he starts with the tiny buttons on his, well, Neville would call it a vest, but it’s probably called something else. He shrugs out of it when he’s finished, hangs it on a hook on the door, slides the door shut. Then he starts on his shirt and Neville sees his chest for the first time. 

He’s as pale as Neville imagined him, but there’s more hair, in wisps around his nipples, below his navel and going down his arms. The Dark Mark stands out on his forearm, dark and menacing. The snake slithers in and out of the skull lazily, its sharp tongue darting out once in a while and then disappearing back into that black mouth.

He’s skinny, skin stretched tight over knobby bones, and here and there the hint of lean muscle. He has scars scattered across his body, not that anyone one would notice if they weren’t as eager to piece his body together in to some sort of story as Neville is. There are small scars on his arms, from scratches or something, and a bigger one on his knee, as well as a pale, jagged scar across his ribs, on the left side, beneath his arm. Neville feels a bit self-conscious now, oddly enough. He himself has only his boxer briefs on and he’d thought he’d feel better now that they’re on even ground, now that he can see more of Snape, but all he feels is a little ashamed of his own body. And there’s excitement of course, but there always in when he’s up in this tower with Snape. 

“Are you going to stare or get in the tub?” Snape asks, sounds irritated, and Neville blinks once, twice. 

“Sorry, it’s just… I haven’t really seen what you looked like before,” he says and smiles a bit sheepishly. 

“It’s a body, there’s nothing special about it,” Snape mumbles, seemingly mostly to himself. 

“There is. You look…”

“You don’t need to give an evaluation,” Snape says, starts on the buttons of his trousers. 

“You look good,” Neville says anyway. 

He turns away, gives Snape some privacy, and dips his fingers into the hot water, before taking off his own underwear and stepping in. 

The tub is more like a small pool, nestled in a corner of the room. Neville could easily stretch out his whole body and not reach the other end, that’s how big it is. He finds that there are little steps, landings, made for sitting and he takes a spot in the corner. The taps suddenly stop gushing water and there’s silence. 

Snape is standing with his back to him, easing his underwear off and putting them neatly in a laundry hamper Neville hadn’t even noticed was there. He has a nice ass, Neville thinks to himself, but this time keeps it to himself. 

Snape turns around and walks slowly to the tub, and Neville knows he’s staring again. He hasn’t ever seen a grown man completely naked like this, not a woman either for that matter. He blushes and has to look away. 

Snape settles in on the other end of the bathtub and then they sit there. Neville’s plan didn’t really get this far. If he had a plan in the first place.

“I wish I had a tub like this,” he says stupidly. He knows Snape dislikes small talk, but can’t help himself. Snape says nothing. 

“Do you…?”

“What?” Snape snaps, and Neville closes his mouth. “You don’t have to talk.”

Neville looks down at the suds of soap, chases one around with his hand. No. He knows he doesn’t have to talk, but it makes him feel a little bit less awkward. 

“My grandmother took me to a lake once,” Neville says and Snape looks at him like he’s the stupidest person alive. 

“Lucky you,” he says, closes his eyes. 

“It was nice,” Neville continues. “My uncle, my great uncle, lives almost around here. There’s a lake just ten minutes away, so I used to go there a lot when I was a kid, when I was visiting. That’s where I learned to swim.”

Snape says nothing, drags a wet hand over his face. 

Neville changes tactic. If he won’t talk to him like a human being, he can at least push some buttons. 

“How did you get that scar?” he asks, and nods towards the scar on his ribs. 

Snape opens his eyes, glances down at himself for just a second. 

“An accident,” he says. Neville tries his luck and pushes off from the side of the tub, moves through the water towards him. He places one hand on his side, on the scar. As Snape breathes, his hand moves with the expansion and compression of his chest.

Snape leans his head to one side, doesn’t look at him. 

“When did it happen?” 

“I was, six or seven.” He hesitates for a second and then, “My father pushed me into a glass table, it punctured the skin. It wasn’t as bad as it looks.”

When he sees it through the water the scar is distorted, wavy. “Oh,” he says. “It must have hurt.” When Snape says nothing, he continues, “What was your father like?”

“Drunk, mostly,” Snape says dryly. Then he shakes his head. “He wasn’t violent, usually. He was shouting at my mother and I stepped between them and,” he ends the sentence abruptly. “It was an accident.”

Neville drops his hand. “What was your mother like?”

“Why do you want to know?” Snape asks, doesn’t sound amused.

“I just want to… I don’t know,” Neville says and shrugs. 

“Is it entertaining for you?” 

Neville moves away. “You don’t have to tell me,” he says, lowers himself down further into the water.

Snape stays silent for almost a full minute and then says, “Unhappy. She was unhappy.”

“What did she do for a living?” Neville asks carefully. 

“She worked odd jobs here and there. She was a seamstress for a while, a cleaning lady at the hostel in town. Mostly she made potions, for neighbours.”

“Did they know she was a witch?” Neville asks, curious. He hasn’t talked to anyone about how it is living so close to muggles. His grandmother’s neighbours are muggles, sure, but they don’t draw attention to themselves like that, they rarely socialize. His grandmother seems to think of muggles as you would think of small children. Stupid but if treated well, not harmful. He doesn’t think she does it on purpose, or is even aware of it, but it wouldn’t cross her mind to sell them potions. But then, she wouldn’t have to either.

“No. Not consciously. They knew she was good with,” Snape says, and says the next words with a sort of mocking quality, “natural remedies. There were mostly neighbourhood women. She’d give them love potions, or concoctions when they wanted to get pregnant, or concoctions when they didn’t want to be pregnant anymore.”

“Was she nice?” 

Snape thinks for a moment. “When she remembered to try, yes.”

Neville nods, leans back and looks at the stars through the window in the ceiling. It’s a clear night. “What was her name?”

“Eileen,” Snape says, quickly, like it’s been on the tip of his tongue the last minutes. Neville smiles weakly at him. 

“It’s pretty,” Neville says and Snape snorts. “Do you not like talking about yourself?”

“It has nothing to do with me,” Snape says, shakes his head. He can’t possibly think that’s true, but Neville decides to drop it. “Maybe I just appreciate a good silence more than you do,” he adds, sounds like he wants to make up for the brusqueness. 

Neville lets out a little laugh. He sinks down into the water again, breathes out and watches the bubbling forming in front of him. 

“Maybe you should gag me? So I don’t talk so much?” Neville half gurgles, his mouth almost underwater. 

“A nice thought,” Snape says, looks him over. “Come here,” he says and reaches out. 

Neville moves through the water slowly, hovers on his haunches in the water, in front of him. Snape arranges him so that Neville leans his back against his chest, sitting half in his lap. Neville leans back, closes his eyes. This is what he wanted, what he always wants. Snape holds him steady with an arm around his waist, hand curled around his hip. 

“If I fall asleep, you’ll keep me from drowning, right?” Neville says, suddenly very sleepy. 

“What do I get in return?” Snape asks, his mouth right next to Neville’s ear. 

“You get to look at my glistening, young body,” Neville laughs. He sounds almost panicked, the laugh at least does. 

“Hm,” Snape says. The hand resting against him shifts slightly. 

“You could fuck me,” Neville says and then waits. He wishes he could see Snape’s face, but then again, what would he see? 

Snape is quiet for a moment and then says, “Would you like that?”

“Are you kidding? Yes,” Neville says, turns around now. Snape is unreadable, as he almost always is.

“Have you thought about it?” Snape asks. 

“Yes, of course I have.”

“Tell me about it.”

Snape is very verbal, Neville has noticed. In certain situations, anyway. ‘Certain situations’ means during sex, or before sex. He constantly tells him how pretty he is, how well he’s doing, and likes for Neville to describe things to him, fantasies he has.

“I mean, I just…” Neville says, and then Snape kisses him, long and slow. He’s a good kisser, as deliberate with his movements as he is otherwise. He grabs at Neville’s neck, rough at first and then gentle. Neville presses up against him, warm and wet.

Neville breaks away, thinks. “I think you’d be good at it. I mean, I haven’t done it before. Not like, not like we’d do it,” he says hesitantly, tries not to sound too scared. He’s leaning in so close that they’re breathing the same, hot humid air. 

Snape has put his hands on his lower back and now he strokes upwards, touches the spot between Neville’s shoulder blades.

“Does it hurt?” Neville asks, braces himself against Snape’s knees to avoid having to put his arms around him. That seems too cheesy right now, even for Neville. 

Snape shakes his head. “No. It might feel uncomfortable, but it’s not supposed to hurt.”

Neville nods. 

“It will feel a little bit different than my fingers. I could give you something, and you could practise?” Snape says, his hands staying still on Neville’s hips now. He’s hard but for the moment Neville is ignoring it. He wants to see if he can get Snape to ask him for it, or better, just make him do it. 

“Like what? One of those plastic things?” Neville shakes his head. “I don’t think I want that. I just want you to, um, I just want you.”

Snape is grabbing him so hard it almost hurts now, straightens out his neck and breathes out. In the water he manoeuvres him easily, and when he pulls him closer it’s easy for Neville to just let him. In this position, his legs are forced apart and his pelvis is almost flush against Snape’s lower stomach. 

“You’ll like it,” Snape says and puts his mouth on his throat, licks around his Adam’s apple and down to his clavicle. He presses his face into the middle of Neville’s chest, breathes in deeply. 

Then he bites down on the piece of flesh Neville sometimes generously calls his pecs, hard enough to break the skin, and Neville jumps, pulls away slightly, but Snape is holding him too tightly for him to really get anywhere. 

“Ow,” he says, instead and Snape laps gently at the bite mark. 

“I’d love to not have to heal you, to make you walk around with my marks,” Snape mumbles, absentmindedly hopping from subject to subject. “You’d look so pretty. Scarred,” he says and Neville can feel his breathing pick up.

He wants to tell him that maybe someday they can do that, but that wouldn’t be true. He doesn’t want to think about the future. 

“Would you like that?” Snape asks, looks at him now.

“Yes,” Neville says, honestly. There’s nothing he loves more than lying in bed, following where Snape has touched him with his own hands. 

“I could get you a collar. So everyone would know who you belong to,” Snape says. Neville shivers. “Who takes care of you.”

Neville can feel how hard he is and gives in. Snape isn’t going to ask for anything, so he does it for him. “Can I touch you, please? Can I get you off?”

Snape laps at him again, and then leans back, lets go of Neville so he too can lean back. “It’s what you’re here for, isn’t it?”

In his quarters or on the earth, Neville doesn’t know, it’s all the same. He feels like he was made for this. It feels like when he had his first Herbology lesson and found out he was good at something, no not just good but brilliant. That’s what it feels like. 

Snape parts his legs slightly and when Neville puts his fingers around his dick he groans, loudly. The water splashes as he moves his hand. He watches Snape’s face. He looks the most open like this, relaxed.

When they’re finished, Snape drains the tub and then performs some sort of spell on Neville, so he won’t smell of his soap. Then he shaves in front of the sink, and Neville sits outside the open door and watches him. The careful way he moves, how he stretches out the skin and then moves the blade and looks critically at himself in the mirror. Yes, maybe a future like this wouldn’t be so bad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> some nice bits of snape being jealous because you know this manbaby wouldn't let things go that easily. 
> 
> also, i only now realise i dont think i've written an explanation for why neville and ginny and luna would share classes and that's 100 % my bad. imagine an explanation where i talk about how neville needed extra classes in transfiguration or something. i think there i was just trying to get the timeline right and completely forgot about making anything else even remotely reasonable.
> 
> hope you had a nice read and a nice day!


	11. Chapter Eleven

Neville doesn’t get much time to keep thinking about the future. 

What happens is that he gets a short note from his grandmother that she’s alright, that she can’t tell him any more than that. And then he gets called to McGonagall’s office, her telling him that there’s been an attack on his grandmother’s house, and that she’s missing. She tells him, as if it’s a comfort, that at least she left some Death Eaters in pretty bad shape.

It wrenches up something in him, something that not even Snape can help calm down. There’s nothing either of them can do. If she’d been captured, he’d made Snape tell him where she was, somehow, but now there’s nothing they can do. He wishes he could send her a letter back, tell her to be strong, but he can’t do anything. Snape lets him sleep over, that night, and Neville lies awake next to him, staring at the ceiling, until he can leave in the morning. 

Even Seamus, the most miserable of them, looks at him with pity. Their detention is over and he gets reckless about when he heads over to Snape’s, keeps leaving earlier and earlier, lives on whatever food Snape keeps in his pantry, stops going to dinner all together. Ginny tries to talk to him about it, thinks he just disappears to go wander the grounds or sleep away the evening in his dorm. He doesn’t tell her otherwise, can’t. 

And then Ginny doesn’t come back from spring break. 

He doesn’t get a letter this time, but hears about it from the Order, that the family is going into hiding, that Ginny won’t come back to school. A lot of the DA haven’t come back either, they’ve lost almost a third of their group. Neville stays in school, of course, has nowhere else to go, and watches them leave and only two thirds return. Neville has to face the rest of the group alone, tell them that he will be taking over the meetings. They don’t take it very well. It’s not a good sign, Neville understands that. They see it as giving up, her leaving, don’t understand that it’s not her choice and that she’d kill to be there. 

He’s never been good with speeches, talking like Ginny or Harry, and he doesn’t say anything grandiose about the future now either. He stays there though, afterwards, so the few people who looked like they were going to cry, can come up to him, get explanations. He tells them that Ginny would have wanted them to stay strong. 

An easy thing to say.

Neville can’t say he stays strong. He sleeps in the Room of Requirement for four nights, doesn’t go to class. None of his teachers report him, but the Carrows find out anyway, stomp into the dining hall and grab him, on one of the few occasions he ventures out. He resists, of course, he has to, and Amycus Carrow grabs him with those filthy hands, slams his face down into the dining table. They seem to know who to pick on, know it’s just him now. They give him three nights of detention, send him to Filch who keeps grumbling about the old ways, the old punishments. Turns out he’s not much of a doer, when it comes to it, just likes to try to scare the students with his old thumb screws or whatever. Neville doesn’t care. It might work on the younger students, but Neville knows he can take it. Filch doesn’t even take away his wand, and Neville feels sorry for him. What a small and stupid man he is. 

He hates Ginny for leaving him with this, he hates Luna for getting caught, he hates, he hates. 

He returns to class again, after a week. His nose is swollen and probably broken, and his ribs hurt, but he’s there. The Carrows jeer, think they’ve broken him. They haven’t, at least he thinks they haven’t. He tells himself he’s lived through worse things than this. 

It takes him about a week but in the end he gets used to it. Being the leader. It’s not such a huge step upward, after all. The Carrows seem more intent on knowing where he is at each moment, not to the extent of following him around, but he finds them waiting for him after class sometimes, lurking in the hallways when he walks back from dinner. Like they want him to think they’re following him. 

They corner him in the library one afternoon, badger him with questions about what he’s researching. It takes them fifteen minutes of harassment before they tell him that they’ve come to take him to Snape’s office. Neville finds it so incredibly funny how they think that’s supposed to scare him. 

They insist on walking him into the office, and then standing there, staring at him like he’s a lab specimen, until Snape can bother to walk in. At least they leave when he tells them to, although begrudgingly.

Both Neville and Snape remain standing when they leave, at either side of the room.

“I can’t stay long,” Neville explains. 

“Seems you can’t stay long in your classes either,” Snape says, sounds tired. Neville is tired too. 

Neville shrugs, peeks at the papers Snape has lying on his desk. “It’s been a, real, um, week.”

“Two weeks. You haven’t come to see me,” Snape says, as Neville drags his hand over what looks like a letter Snape had been writing. 

“No,” Neville says, and the papers swivel into the air, find their way to Snape’s hands. He looks up at him, and he’s closer than Neville would have thought. He gives in, takes a step towards Snape and leans his forehead onto his shoulder, where the neck meets torso. He smells, again, like lavender. “Did you miss me?” he asks, smiling. 

“You can’t disappear like that,” Snape says, doesn’t bring his arms up to envelop him. 

“Mhmm,” Neville says and then Snape brings his hands up to his hair, jerks his head back. “Were you worried?”

“Yes, I was worried,” he hisses. “You cannot disappear like that.”

“Let me go,” Neville says and Snape just tightens his hand, to where it almost hurt too much. “Red,” he says finally, when Snape just glares at him. 

He lets him go. He takes a step back and straightens his robes. 

“I’m sorry,” Neville says, doesn’t want to argue. “There was a lot going on.”

“What?” Snape says, and by the look on his face Neville would think he was angry with him, but his tone is oddly tender. 

“You know already, right? The Weasleys, they’re in hiding,” he says, leans on the desk. “That, and the thing with my grandmother. It’s… It’s a lot.”

Snape’s face softens almost unnoticeably.

Neville smiles at him, feels stupid. “I’m not upset, with you or otherwise. I was fine, I am fine.”

“The Carrows are imbeciles,” Snape says after a long moment of silence. “It was the least suspicious way I—”

“Yeah, no, it’s fine,” Neville says, accepts what he said as the almost apology that it is. “They didn’t break my nose this time, so.”

Snape steps forward, takes Neville’s chin in one hand and turns his face to inspect his nose, he guesses. 

“Do I look tough?” Neville asks, laughs. Snape still looks serious, as always.

“It’s going to heal crooked,” Snape says. “Do you want my help?”

“No,” he says and turns his head away. “They’ll wonder who did it for me. And anyway, at least I think it makes me look tough.”

“You don’t look tough,” Snape says, his hand falling to his side. “You look sweet. You always look sweet.”

Neville huffs out a laugh. “Is that a compliment?”

Neville is almost blushing, the silence stretches on. They kiss, softly, Neville still leaning against the desk. He rarely moves his hands when they do this, but now he brings them up to Snape’s cheek, brushes his hair out of his face. 

He opens the desk drawer, takes out a bottle of healing lotion. “Sit down,” he says and gestures to the sofa. “I can help with the bruising and the pain at least.”

He sits down next to Neville and gently puts the cream on, where the skin is dark and swollen. He knows he looks like crap. Bruising flares from the root of his nose to his cheekbones, creates dark, dark circles around his eyes. It follows the length of his nose too, red and irritated down the sides of it. Snape uses only the tips of his fingers and when he’s finished the pounding in his face has abated, is almost completely gone. 

“Can you put some on my ribs too?” Neville asks him quietly and keeps his eyes on him as he starts to unbutton his shirt. 

“It might be broken,” Snape says and then, for some reason he says his name, “Neville,” like someone else would say ‘baby’, ‘sweetheart’, ‘love’. Neville leans in, kisses him until Snape pulls away, frowning at his ribs. They’re awfully touchy feely this afternoon. 

“I don’t think it’s broken,” Neville says, quietly and Snape makes a face.

“We’ll see.”

Neville only opens his shirt, carefully moves his arm up above his head so Snape can look. He says some incantation, and then looks up. 

“It’s not broken.”

“That’s what I told you,” Neville says, smiles. Snape pushes against the bruising on his side, seemingly out of spite, and Neville stops smiling, sucks in a breath. “I’ll be fine,” he says through gritted teeth. 

“Let’s go upstairs,” Snape says, without putting any lotion on him. 

They do, and Neville sits down on a chair in the potions room and lets Snape give him disgusting potions, and lets him smear lotions on him. He lets him fuss over him. It feels good. He doesn’t have to decide anything right now. He lets Snape push him here and there and watches his face as he works on him. Neville is the work. He smiles. 

Snape tries pushing down on his skin again, and Neville feels nothing but Snape’s hands. “That’s good,” he says. “Thank you.”

Snape nods. 

“Have you eaten?” he asks, wipes his hands with a small towel. 

“No,” he says. “Are you asking me to dinner?”

He stands up and faces away as he’s buttoning up his shirt, so he doesn’t see Snape’s face when the fireplace flares up, large flames of purple staining the walls. 

He stalks past him, brushes his shoulder on the way and then turns around when he gets to the doorway. “Stay in here, stay quiet,” he says and Neville’s pulse is sky high. 

“What is it? Who’s coming?” he asks, and Snape looks like wants to throttle him. 

“Quiet. Whatever happens, do not open this door.”

And then he turns out all the lights, shuts the door and Neville stands there alone in the dark potions room, his hands shaking.

It takes him a moment, more than a moment, to dare glance through the keyhole, but before then he can hear them of course, muffled. There seems to be two male voices, one female. And then Snape of course. He stands there and listens to the two men shout, the woman adding one or two sharp words here and there. Snape sounds upset, angry. 

When he gets down on his knees and presses his face to the keyhole, he can see there are four new people, one who had been completely quiet. The quiet man is on his knees in front of the fireplace, his hair covering his face. Neville feels the lump in his throat so clearly it feels like it’s getting physically harder to breathe.

Snape is talking again, asking them in that way he has, why they’ve decided to barge in to his private quarters like this. 

The people must be Death Eaters, or Snatchers. Neville doubts that they’re Snatchers though, they wouldn’t be here like this. They’re after the money and sometimes honour, but they wouldn’t be here like this. He doesn’t recognise any of them anyhow. One of the men is tall, auburn hair and long limbs, and a gash down the side of his arm. It seems fresh. He looks, and sounds, older than Snape. The woman looks about Snape’s age, has her hair in a large braid that runs down her back. The third man Neville thinks is younger, based on how he moves, but he can’t be sure. He keeps bouncing around the room, excited and jittery, and it’s hard to really tell what he looks like. 

Snape doesn’t seem to like any of them, especially not when the woman explains coldly that they found, what she calls “a filthy runaway” in Hogsmeade. She circles the man on the floor, and then lifts his head up, leans in. 

Neville knows who that is. He’s seen him before, here at Hogwarts. A boy a few years older than him, a Hufflepuff. They’ve never spoken to each other, Neville doesn’t even think he knows his name, but he knows his face, even when it’s this roughed up. He’s breathing harshly, has dried blood in his hair and is clutching his left arm. Neville doesn’t really know much about anatomy, but by how it’s hanging limply, he guesses it might be dislocated. 

“You’ve brought me a runaway?” Snape asks, sounds unimpressed. 

The woman speaks quietly so Neville has to really try to hear her. The men are quiet, except for the noises the younger one makes, small breathing noises and excited mewls. 

Neville hears the woman raise her voice, say, “We’re on your turf. Thought you would appreciate the notice.”

“How polite of you. You didn’t consider I might have more important things to handle?” Snape asks coldly. 

“Apparently you do,” she says and smiles, an unsettling smile, all teeth and no happiness. 

“Are you implying something?” Snape asks, and the other man, the quiet one, makes a noise. 

“Also, we thought you might have something for that,” she says impatiently, nods towards the tall man’s arm. 

Neville wants so badly for Snape to tell them to leave, that he’ll handle it, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t do anything, but offer the man some healing potion. 

He feels like pounding on the door, he feels like shouting. But Neville doesn’t do anything either. 

“Do you want him then?” she asks. “He’d make a lovely example, I think. Wouldn’t you sweetheart?”

She touches the man’s cheek, almost lovingly. He says nothing, just glares at them. 

Snape is quiet for a second, then says, “Take him in to the Ministry and collect the bounty.”

The woman smirks again, and this time is joined by the jittery man, who laughs loudly, a rough laugh. The other man is busy taking care of his wound. 

And then the kneeling man lunges. He manages to get to his feet before Snape can raise his wand, even takes three or four steps towards the door. The woman has stopped smirking, but doesn’t seem to have the reflexes to manage to raise her wand in time. Snape does though. 

“Crucio,” he says, and the boy falls to the ground like a log. Just drops. The last thing Neville sees before he pushes away from the door, stumbles to the floor, is the man convulsing and then Snape’s face, empty of expression. 

He almost falls as he clambers away from the door, but doesn’t at the last minute. No one will notice the sound of him scrambling around, not with the commotion outside the door. He can hear Snape yelling, and then someone answering him, and then shouting again.

He thinks of his parents. He mumbles their names into the darkness, into the stale air of this room. Alice. Frank. He squeezes his eyes shut. 

When he opens them it’s quiet. He feels around him, feels the cold stone underneath his hands start to become more real, more solid. He tries to calm his breathing. 

When Snape opens the door, finally, Neville is still shaking but his breathing is calmer. Snape stands there in the doorway, a dark figure surrounded by the light rushing in from the other room, and for the first time in years, Neville feels nothing but fear when he sees him.

“They’re gone,” Snape says, and it takes a moment for Neville to connect the voice to this towering, dark presence. The voice is good, he’s heard that voice say so many nice things. “You can get up, they’re gone,” Snape repeats and reaches for Neville where he’s half lying, half sitting on the floor.

Neville pushes away from the floor, scrambles away from Snape. “Don’t-“ he starts, doesn’t recognise the croak coming out of his throat. He can’t be like this here, he tells himself. He needs to get up. Snape is talking again, but Neville is barely even registering it. 

He gets to his feet, legs as shaky and unstable as his hands. “Why did you do that?” he mumbles, so quiet that Snape can’t hear him, continues talking over him. 

“Are you alright?” he asks, reaches for him again. 

How can he ask him that? Neville suddenly needs to go out in the living room, needs to see for himself where the boy bled into the carpet, where he stood on his knees, where they forced him to the floor. He does, pushes past Snape roughly and goes out into the dimly lit round room. There’s no trace of them except for some books, knocked over onto the floor. Neville remembers, that’s where he pushed off to try to get to the door. He picks them up, holds them, two small dark and leather-bound books with no visible titles. 

“Why did you do that?” he asks, louder this time.

Snape has followed him, is standing as far away as he can, on the other side of the sofa. 

“Do what?” he asks, seems like he’s apprehensive, like Neville is acting strangely.

Neville might start crying, he can feel it pushing behind his eyes. “Did they take him with them?” he asks instead of repeating himself. 

Snape nods, sighs. Like this is hard for him. Hard for him. 

“What’s going to happen to him?” 

Neville wants to scream at him but nothing but this weak, quiet whisper comes out. 

“They’ll take him to the Ministry,” Snape says. “They won’t touch him, otherwise they won’t get their money.”

Neville shakes his head, looks down at his hands, at the books he can’t seem to put down. 

“Why did you do that? You didn’t have to do that.”

Snape seems to understand now, is walking towards him slowly, his hands open, palms facing Neville. “I had to,” he says. 

“No,” Neville says, shakes his head again. “No, no, you didn’t.”

“How much of it did you hear?” Snape asks, still coming closer. “She implied I was weak, that I wasn’t doing my duty.”

“What?” Neville says, backing away. Soon he won’t be able to back away any further, won’t be able to get away. He feels his breathing grow rapid again. 

“If rumour gets out that I’m not loyal, the Dark Lord would kill me,” Snape says. His eyes are dark. “You have no idea what he can do to people. Things worse than death. I had to do that.”

And all that is fine in theory. In real life though, Neville can’t get the look on his face out of his head. The awful thud that the other man’s body had made as he’d landed on the floor. Snape’s arm, stretched out strong and decisive. And then that word. You can’t perform the curse if you don’t mean it. Snape meant it, somewhere. 

Neville thinks of Mad-Eye Moody, or the man they thought was him, comforting him after class. The Death Eater, patting Neville’s back, giving him a book on Herbology, telling him he’d heard he was a good student. Neville had mistaken that for genuine care as well. 

Snape is so close now that Neville can smell him, can feel the heat of his body. He’s crowding him in between himself and a bookcase, leaning over him. 

“Don’t touch me,” Neville says and Snape does anyway, reaches out a hand to touch his face, gently. 

Neville hates him. He hates him so much in this moment that he feels like he’s going to be sick. He hates that he let him do those things to him, hates that he liked it, hates that he knows what Snape looks like when he’s sleeping. 

When Snape realises he’s not getting a response, he drops his hand to his side, still leaning over him. “Forgive me,” he says, quietly. 

The worst thing is, Neville knows he will. He knows he’ll be back, next week probably, maybe in just a few days. He needs Snape. He needs to feel the way Snape makes him feel. He hates that he asks this of him. 

Snape leans in again, presses a kiss to his cheek. “Please, I’m sorry.”

“Would you do that if it was me?” Neville asks, and Snape shakes his head. Neville can feel his stubble against his face. 

“No, no, of course I wouldn’t,” he says and Neville feels so enormously tired. He feels like something drains out of him, like he’s just meat, just a disgustingly useless body. 

Snape always feels slightly larger than him, in personality and in physical size, and now he feels enormous. Like wherever Neville looks there is Snape, surrounding him, smothering him. “Get away from me,” Neville mumbles into the crook of his neck. “Don’t touch me.”

Snape looks up, hesitantly leans away. “Neville…” he says quietly. 

“Don’t. I don’t care, I don’t want you to… I can’t,” he says. He wants a shower. He wants to scrub himself until there’s nothing left of him. He wants to disappear. 

\--

Severus doesn’t realise how much he enjoys the way Neville looks at him, until he sees nothing but fear and disgust in those pretty blue eyes. He has built this image of himself, no they have both built it together, cultivated it in the eyes of that stupid boy, and now there’s nothing there. Instead of Severus Snape, brave, empathetic, powerful, there is nothing. 

The boy pushes him away and leaves and Severus doesn’t stop him. He wishes he could explain it in a way that makes sense to him, in a way that makes it all clear. Explain how there is a role and there is Severus and he has to make these two people make sense in his head, has to blur the lines so much that no one even knows where to look for them. 

He wishes he had explained that, but instead he sits in his empty apartment, feeling sorry for himself in the dark. 

The boy needs to see that the world isn’t all stark white and deep black, there are shades. The world is tough. He doesn’t understand that yet. Maybe that’s what Severus is. A teachable example about grey. Maybe Severus is the world’s rough edges, jagged and sharp and ready to tear into Neville Longbottom.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> angst! im lovin it


	12. Chapter Twelve

It takes him nine days to go back into Severus’ quarters again. Severus isn’t proud of it, but he counts the days, the hours.

He doesn’t send the Carrows again. That wouldn’t achieve anything. He’d be there, but the tenseness would be there too. He tells himself that he needs to give him time, and then he’ll come around. He has to.

Severus feels like a teenager. Emotional and weak. But he brought this on himself. Neville has infected him with this. The boy is too kind, his eyes are too kind, he’s too soft.

He doesn’t understand. There are more important things than saving a boy from thirty seconds of agony. He’s alive. And if Severus hadn’t performed the curse on him, the rest of the group would have done something worse. New Death Eaters, trying to prove themselves. If Severus hadn’t showed them he was in charge, there would have been chaos. Neville doesn’t seem to understand that. Short term thinking. 

When he finally shows up, Severus forgets to be angry about how little he understands. He’s missed him, and, terrifyingly enough, it outweighs the need to be right. 

“How are… things?” he asks, when Severus has led him up to his quarters. They sit at the kitchen table, Neville drinking tea and Severus drinking whiskey. Neville fiddles with the ear on his cup, pulls it back and forth on the table. An endearing thing. 

Severus doesn’t know how to answer that. Voldemort is in a good mood, and something hangs in the air, like a pressing warmth. Everyone is waiting for thunder, holding their breath and scrambling to get their affairs in order. Something is going to happen, soon. 

Severus shakes his head. “Fine. How are you?”

Neville smiles nervously into his cup of tea and then the smile fades. He shuffles the cup back and forth again, doesn’t say anything. 

Severus wants to take him away. He wants to take him somewhere where he can’t be hurt, where he can be happy and safe and where Severus himself can be the man Neville has constructed. 

“I’m sorry,” he says again. 

“The thing is,” Neville says, his eyes on the table. “I used to be able to hate you.”

Severus leans forward, puts his hand on Neville’s knee. “What do you want me to say?”

“I don’t want you to say anything,” he says, looks at the hand. Severus hasn’t felt this small in years. 

“I…” he says and then closes his mouth again. It’s a big thing, what he wants to tell him. It’s just words, but Severus hasn’t ever said it to anyone. Not to partners, not even to his parents. He feels like the words might not come out of his mouth right, might not mean what they’re supposed to when he says it. He doesn’t say it, in the end. He’d be a different man if he did. He just squeezes his leg, hopes it will be enough. 

\--

Neville feels like he’s giving up, but maybe he’s just giving in to the inevitable. He thinks the mistake he made was to think that Snape was a good man and then to love that man, and now he’s stuck here, loving this wreck of selfishness and pettiness and cruelty. 

“I want you to be meaner, this time,” he says, and Snape looks confused. Neville gets down on his knees. “Tell me I’m bad.”

This is the only thing that seems appropriate. He needs for Snape to be less sad, more dominant. He needs to feel smaller, for Snape to be bigger. Snape is leaning back in his chair, is bringing one hand up to his face. 

“How?” he says, his voice weak. Neville moves to between his legs, puts his hands on him. 

He shakes his head lazily, sloppily, leans against the inside of Snape’s thigh. “I’m dirty,” he says and Snape brings his hands to his head. 

“Yes,” he says, and Neville can almost see it on him, how he builds something inside him. “You are. You’re filthy. You’re weak.”

“Yeah,” Neville says, leaves wet traces behind from his open mouth against Snape’s trousers. 

“You don’t get to speak,” Snape says, eyes intent on him. He keeps watching him as Neville, with careful fingers, undoes the buttons. “Do you like being on your knees like this?”

Neville nods again, sluggishly. 

“It’s all you’re good for,” Snape says and warmth spreads inside him, blooms. He thinks he might be able to forgive Snape, like this. “Aren’t I gracious for letting you touch me?”

Neville nods. When he takes Snape out of his pants, he’s hard and dripping. He twitches in his hand. 

“Do you think you deserve it?” he asks, and Neville doesn’t do anything, just looks up at him. “Show me you deserve it. Show me you deserve my time.”

Neville takes him in his mouth, slowly. He wants Snape to feel how much he wants this. He pops it out of his mouth, and then licks, down to his balls. Snape sucks in a breath, the hand on the back of Neville’s head tightens its grip. Neville purposefully doesn’t swallow, keeps his mouth open and jaw slack and when he pulls back again Snape is glistening with his spit. 

“Try harder,” Snape says and Neville takes him in his mouth again, as far as he can. He splutters and gags and pulls away, and Snape lets out a sound, like a choked laugh. When he speaks again, his voice is shaky. “You’re so lucky I let you, let you do-“ he starts and then bites off the last word when Neville sucks in. 

He pushes Neville’s head down, makes him gag again. “Oh God,” he says, breaks role for just a second. “You’re so filthy, you look so filthy.”

And then he pulls him off, nails scratching Neville’s scalp.

“I want to take you to bed,” he says. Neville wants to laugh at the wording, but doesn’t. He just sits back on his haunches, looks up at him. “You can talk. Do you want to?” Neville shakes his head and Snape licks his lips. “Alright. What do you-?”

“No,” Neville says. “I want you to make me.”

Snape drags his hand across his face. “I…”

“I’ll tell you if it’s too much. I know my safeword.”

Snape hesitates again, and then let’s his head go. “Alright,” he says, and then, louder, “Get up. The bedroom.”

Neville does as he’s told and Snape follows him, watches him as he closes the door and gets on the bed. He sits there, on his knees, and Snape gets up next to him. He grabs his head again, pulls it back hard. He kisses him, a drawn out, wet mess of a kiss and then pulls at his shirt. “Take it off. All of it.”

Neville starts and Snape, impatiently, tugs again and two buttons pop off, clatter against the floorboards. Neville clambers out of his shirt and then lies back and pulls at his own trousers, his underwear. 

When he’s naked, Snape descends on top of him, pressing almost chaste kisses to his chest, lapping at one of his nipples. One of his hands stray to Neville’s dick, squeezes and then strokes, quickly. 

From then on, Neville seems to sort of lose track of time, of what’s happening. He stares at the ceiling, can feel it when Snape gets up and then comes back, naked this time. He feels Snape’s fingers, wet and slick now, grasp him again and glide over the head of his dick, down to his balls and then lower. He bucks into his hand. 

“You’re too gentle,” Neville says and Snape grabs his leg, pulls him down further on the bed, as if to prove that no, he isn’t. 

Snape pushes a finger in, and sure, Neville knows this part. He relaxes, tries not to clench down as Snape starts to move, adds another finger. It’s not until the third it gets really uncomfortable, starts to almost hurt. Snape goes faster, not like he usually does. This is fucking, Neville thinks. For real. 

Snape pulls away, removes his fingers. Neville watches as he pours lube from a bottle onto himself, strokes two or three times and then puts one hand next to Neville’s head, keeping the other on his dick. 

“Legs up higher,” Snape says. He seems to have abandoned the meanness, for now. He wanted this to be a game too, he wanted to pretend to fight him off, to wriggle out of his reach, but Snape seems so serious that Neville just lies there, in anticipation. There’s no fear, though, just that bubbly anticipation. 

And then Snape, on his knees, lowers down and Neville can feel him pushing at him and then he’s pushing into him and it takes a second for the pain to arrive. He holds his breath as Snape moves closer, further into him.

Snape kisses at the side of his mouth, at his cheek. “You feel so good.”

Neville releases the breath he has been holding. Now Neville is scared, feels like if Snape moves, he’ll fall apart. He clutches at his neck, his shoulders, tangles his fingers in his hair. 

Snape moves his hips tryingly, pulls out halfway and then slowly pushes in again and Neville feels like he’s drowning, like Snape is going to break him. Snape lied, before, when he said it wouldn’t hurt. It does hurt. Not as much as some of the other things Snape has done to him, but differently. 

Snape brings one of his hands up to prop his leg up, to watch his dick moving in and out of him. His mouth is open, he looks ugly, the skin around his eyes wrinkling with the face he’s making. Ugly but his. Neville pulls him down for a kiss and their mouths meet sloppily, knocking their teeth together. 

Snape moves faster now, his hips slamming erratically into him. He’s making these little noises, like he wants to say something, like he starts to say something and then is overwhelmed. His chest is moving rapidly up and down, like he’s run a mile. 

And then it feels good. His erection has gone down, with the anticipation and then the pain, but now it feels good and his dick is interested again. Neville feels opened, like Snape has found something hidden in him that even he didn’t know was there. No, that they’ve done it together. 

He starts to move his hips up towards him, to meet his thrusts, to match his rhythm. It starts to feel more like something they’re doing together than something Snape is doing to him. 

And then Snape brings his hand down to Neville’s dick, tugs harshly and Neville almost sobs. He comes before Snape does, makes a mess all over them. It’s wrung out of him, like he’s nothing but muscles and veins and blood. He’s barely aware of Snape saying something, groaning and then lowering himself down on top of him. They breathe together for a few moments. Neville feels nothing but warmth. 

Snape rolls off him, lies there and breathes, on his own. His chest heaves, up and down. 

“We didn’t use a condom,” Neville says into the air, the silence. Snape laughs, hoarse and out of breath, empty.

“No,” he says. “Should we have?”

“No, I guess not.”

Neville lies like that until he lands in his own body, lands in the throbbing pain in his nose, the dull ache in his ribs. His legs are sore from bending like that. They don’t say anything for a long time.

Neville starts talking without looking over at Snape, just keeps staring at the rafters, the stone in the ceiling, the cracks. 

“The thing is, about me being upset you did that. The thing is… You help me, all the time. You heal me up, you’re nice to me. And then you do that. That kid didn’t have anyone to heal his ribs up. I know that my grandmother’s alright somewhere out there, I know where my parents are, I know where you are. That kid has parents, probably, who don’t know where he is.”

Snape puts his hand on his belly, on the soft round spot beneath his navel that turns into a roll when he sits up, and leaves it there, heavy and warm and silent.

\--

He believes in the goodness of others. It seems to stem, not from him being unfamiliar with the evil things people can do, he’s been subjected to that sort of evil, but from being unable to see himself doing acts of evil. Isn’t that selfish? Projecting his own thoughts, his own person, on others like that?

Severus fucks him again, in the shower. He’s too clingy, he knows that, can’t seem to stop touching him, can’t stop running his hands over his warm and wet body. When he takes him in the shower, the boy half leaning and half pressed up against the wall, he’s already prepped and loose and ready for him. He knows he should use his fingers first, but doesn’t, just holds him tight and fucks into him, and the boy lets him. He makes the most precious noises, like he’s surprised that it’s happening, each trust, or like he’s surprised that it feels good. Small, rapid breaths, and Severus is convinced he doesn’t even know he’s making them. 

Severus, in turn, lets him sleep in his bed. After they’re finished, he’s so soft and pliant and relaxed that Severus can’t bear to send him on his way. He knows he shouldn’t, that it’s dangerous, but as he watches him pull the covers tight around them and then pull Severus closer to him, he can’t seem to care. He watches him as he falls asleep, feels his breath against his chest slow and his body become heavy.

He dreams of open doors, behind them only darkness, and then not only darkness but something moving, something slithering across the floor towards him. Clammy and cold it reaches for him, slithers up his limbs, around his throat and then into his mouth, darkness all around him. He can’t breathe, and it fills up his lungs and his veins and his head. 

He wakes up in a cold sweat, Neville leaning over him with worried eyes, the sheets pooling around them. 

“I’m fine,” Severus gets out, before Neville starts talking. He knows he won’t be able to go back to sleep now, but leans back against the pillows anyway and Neville does as well, his eyes still on him. 

“You were making noises, thrashing around. It woke me up,” Neville says, his voice sleepy. 

“It was a dream,” Severus says and Neville smiles, his eyes drooping closed.

“Yeah, I got that,” he mumbles, presses closer to him. He falls asleep again, as Severus strokes his back, up to his neck and the too long locks of hair. 

Severus hasn’t ever shared a bed with someone like this. Occasionally yes, he’d fucked someone for a night, slept for a few hours before leaving, but not like this. He hasn’t invited someone into his bedroom, his bed, and expected them to be there in the morning. No, he hasn’t wanted them to be there. 

Severus sleeps off and on, an anxious and shallow sleep. When light starts to seep in through the curtains, he watches Neville as he’s pulled back into reality, into this room, this bed. 

“Hey,” he says, when he becomes conscious enough that he can tell Severus is looking at him. 

“Did you sleep well?” he asks and Neville nods. 

“Yeah,” he says and then frowns. “What was your dream about?”

“Nothing. It was just…” he says, trails off. Maybe he’s tired too.

“Yeah, I get those dreams too,” he says groggily, while rubbing his eyes. “I used to have this dream about my parents, that they recognised me, but they were wrong. You know? They just kept saying my name over and over, getting closer and closer. Moving funny.”

Severus sits up and Neville stops talking. “You should stay.”

“What?”

“Stay. Until evening.”

Severus doesn’t expect him to say yes, but he does, a quiet and hesitant, “Yeah, sure.”

It’s Saturday, he doesn’t have classes. Sometimes, Severus knows, he goes down to the greenhouses, helps Sprout tend to the plants. And sometimes on Saturdays, he disappears, has a meeting with that group, he guesses, but they’ve stopped having a predetermined day for it. Clever, they’re less likely to be caught that way.

“Can we go back to sleep though? Your bed’s really comfortable. And I want you to, um, to fuck me again.”

“I’d like to tie you up,” Severus says. “Now, when we have time.”

Neville smiles.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm a softie, snape's a softie, neville most of all is a softie. in the words of ween: it's gonna be alright baby


	13. Chapter Thirteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a heads up: there is some negotiation of rape kink in this chapter

He uses a version of Incarcerous, watches from the arm chair in his potions room as rope flies out of his wand to wrap around Neville’s soft skin. Neville is on the floor in front of him, on his knees on the ugly red rug he brought from Spinner’s End. To make the place homier. Like a rug would ever make him feel like him being in the Headmaster’s quarters was anything but a mistake.

“How does it feel?” he asks, watches for spots where the rope is too tight, too loose. Neville has his hands behind his back, his posture straight. His arms are locked in place, rope at his wrists and then by his elbows and shoulders, continuing to wind around his chest and his waist. He looks like a work of art. 

This, the pure aesthetic beauty of it, is almost the sweetest part. It is unthinkable now, that there was a time when he thought the boy was unattractive. That he thought he was pathetic and weak. That’s the other part. If Neville was weak, it wouldn’t be any fun. That he lets him, that he gives in, submits even though he could fight it, that’s the sweetest part. 

“I can’t move. Like not at all,” Neville says, his hair falling across his face as he struggles against the ties. Severus leans over, brushes it out of his face, like he’s being merciful.

He tilts his head, wants Neville to elaborate. With him like this, he can make him keep talking however long he wants, there’s nothing he can do about it. He could leave him here on the floor, go work on something. 

“It feels good,” he says. “I like it.”

“Don’t fight the ties,” he says. “Just enjoy it.”

He looks up at him. How he can continue to look so innocent, so clean, is amazing. Even like this, almost naked, kneeling, wanting to be touched, wanting to be struck or filthened, or fucked. Waiting for it like an inevitability, and still, he looks, he looks sweet, he looks soft. Severus leans forward and hits him, once, with his hand, across the face.

“Yeah,” Neville gets out with a puff of air, as he wobbles slightly but then straightens up on his knees again. 

“I could leave you here,” Severus says. “Lock you up in here and forget you and you’d never get to touch me again. Never get to touch yourself again.”

“No, please,” he jumps into a character instantly, a character still so much himself. His voice is soft, not yet begging. “Sir, don’t.”

“Do you have any idea the things I could make you do? Like this?”

“No, sir.”

He has no idea either. His head is a blank, or maybe, too full of all the things there are to do with Neville Longbottom. He doubts he’d say no to anything Severus could imagine. He beckons him closer, and he scrambles to obey, shuffles his knees unsteadily against the carpet until he’s seated on the floor between Severus’ knees. He brings his hand to his head, his face, cradles him and turns him forward and back. He’s so pliant, still. 

It’s almost too much, having him here like this. The rope digs into the skin on his stomach, the muscles in his arms. He’ll have marks, that Severus can touch later, when they’re finished, when he fucks him in his bed. Neville will let him touch him.

“Use your mouth,” he says now and guides his head to his crotch, just holding him steady so he won’t topple over. As he opens his mouth around one of the buttons on his trousers, Severus watches him. He presses his whole face into the fabric, says nothing, tries so very hard to be good for him. He pulls back, with some difficulty and breathes through his open mouth before leaning forward, and trying again. When he gets a button open, by biting down and tugging, Severus can feel him smiling, through the fabric, can feel the muscles in his face move right up against his dick. He’s hard, rock hard. 

He lets him try a little longer, lets him get him all wet, drool all over him, before taking mercy on him and unbuttoning. He pulls himself out and Neville watches him, leans his cheek against his thigh. 

“Do you want it?” 

He nods, slow and with eye contact. Cocky. 

“Go on then,” he says and holds his dick steady as Neville slobbers on him, open mouth on his balls and then up his shaft. His face is wet, and as he closes his eyes, he looks not completely there. He moves his tongue over his shaft and it feels like heaven. Severus can’t possibly deserve something this good. 

He lets him go on licking at him, drooling, until he can’t take it anymore, and then he grabs his head and guides him to swallow. He might be too rough. He might. He comes down Neville’s throat, and doesn’t let him pull away until he’s swallowed, until he’s swallowed every drop. Then he releases him, down onto the rug, and when Severus releases him from the ropes, he continues lying there, rubs at the marks on his body. 

“Hey, get up,” he says, as he tucks himself back in his pants. He gets no response other than that Neville rolls his head to face him, smiles, and then looks up at the ceiling again. “Get to bed,” he says, buttons up. 

“Okay. Can you do something for me though?” he says, still facing the ceiling. He lies there, slack now, his muscles melting into the floor. “Can you fuck me again, later?”

“Yes,” Severus says, without thinking. “Later.”

He doesn’t have the stamina of a seventeen year old.

When Neville gets to his feet, Severus kisses him, long and slow. 

“I like that you do that. Kiss me after I’ve gone down on you,” Neville says, lets Severus guide him back to the bedroom, back to the warm covers. “Why do you do that?”

Severus hasn’t realised. “I like the taste. I suppose. On you.”

Neville smiles as he plops down on the bed, and Severus takes the opportunity to stare at him, drink in all those marks, all that skin. Warm, inviting, all his. 

\--

Snape makes him food. He heats up some meat pie, potatoes, vegetables. Neville recognises it from last night’s dinner, in the Great Hall. 

“Do you ever cook?” Neville asks, as Snape stands by the stove, makes coffee for himself. Neville is wearing a bathrobe, Snape’s bathrobe, is sitting at the kitchen table. It’s sweet, that he sort of cooks for him. 

“Sure,” Snape says, doesn’t look up. He’s been quiet, keeps staring at him. 

“You seem like a guy that would have like, an herb garden,” Neville says. The way the question makes him sound, strikes him a second too late, after he’s already said it. It makes it sound like he thinks about Snape, speculates. 

“I don’t,” he says, very generous, for him. He usually only answers direct questions about himself, and mostly only after Neville has nagged him. 

“I’d like one,” Neville says, pulls his legs up under him. Snape puts the plate in front of him, along with a glass of water. Neville picks at the piece of pie. “A nice herb garden, some oregano, mint, thyme. Maybe, a larger garden, carrots, potatoes, beans.”

“Sounds lovely,” Snape says and Neville can’t tell he’s being sarcastic until he looks up at him, meets an uninterested face. 

Neville shakes his head. “I should have known you wouldn’t like that. You know what, I don’t think you’d have an herb garden.”

“I’m terribly offended,” Snape says, raises his cup of coffee to his mouth. And then, just before taking a sip, he says, “I like the idea of you having a garden.”

There’s something in the sentence that makes Neville blush. He looks down at his plate, scarfs down a few more bites. Eating in the Great Hall has been rough the last few months, having to look over his shoulder all the time, having to watch out for the Carrows or their little followers. Even at times like now, when he has privacy, he can’t stop rushing through meals. 

“Do you have a backyard. In Spinner’s End?” he asks, and Snape takes a long swig of his coffee. Neville likes how now he can tell the difference between Snape’s expressions, notices the small tics and habits and muscle spasms that tell him if he’s upset, cornered, about to scream at him or about to push his body against him. But still, even now, he moves so carefully, and rehearsed that it’s hard for Neville to tell every time, what he’s thinking. Now, he looks uncomfortable.

“Yes,” he says, blinks slowly and then looks down into his cup. 

Neville takes pity on him. He smiles, offers up his plate of food, “Do you want some?”

Snape hesitates for a second and then grabs the fork Neville holds out to him, leans forward and takes a bite.

This is a date, right? This is what people do on dates? Share food, talk about the future?

“How do your arms feel?” Snape asks, carefully, softly. 

This isn’t what people talk about. Or, it doesn’t feel like this is normal conversation at least. But what does Neville know, really? He thinks he might have fallen into making this more special than it is. But Snape looking at him like that, eating food off his plate, talking to him like this. How can this not be special, how can this not be unique?

“They feel fine. I wasn’t, um, tied up long,” Neville mumbles. “You, um, you promised you would…”

Snape looks at him over the edge of his coffee cup. “What?”

When his head isn’t all fuzzy, it’s much harder talking about it. He blushes again, this time for a completely different reason. 

“You said you’d be meaner,” Neville says, can’t bear to look at him. They do a lot of things but this is something different. He doesn’t know if Snape will do this with him. 

“Wasn’t I?” he asks, and Neville pulls the robe tighter around himself. 

“Um, I… It was good, but, I wanted you to…”

“Rougher?” Snape asks, raises his eyebrows slightly. “You said you wanted me to… make you?”

He thanks his lucky stars that Snape likes to talk so much, when it comes to this. Snape doesn’t seem to have any embarrassment about things like this. That’s a relief. “Yeah.”

Snape looks away from him, down into his lap. He leans back. “What do you mean by that?”

Neville shifts in his seat. “We don’t have to. I mean, if you don’t want to… I can…”

“You mean ‘make you’ as in ‘force you’?” he asks. 

Neville can’t stop himself from breathing out a large breath, relieved. Snape doesn’t sound disgusted, doesn’t sound angry. He nods. “Yeah.”

Snape doesn’t say anything for a few moments and Neville shifts nervously again. “I…” he starts, and takes a breath. “I didn’t want to be too, well-“

“I want you to. I can take it.”

“I know you can,” he says and pushes the plate away from him. “Do you want more?” 

When Neville shakes his head, he stands up and starts to clear the table. With his back to him, he says, “Tell me more specifically.”

“Hold me down. A bit. You could, I don’t know, put your hands around my neck.”

Snape doesn’t react at all. On purpose probably. Which means he either really likes it or really hates it. He decides to push, stares at Snape’s back as he talks.

“I could…” Neville starts and Snape turns around, silences him just with one look.

“If you use your safeword,” he says, and Neville nods, vigorously. “I don’t want to pretend you don’t want it,” he continues. “Do you understand?”

“Yes.”

“I won’t pretend to… force myself on you. If you cry, I’ll stop.”

“Yes. No, fine.” 

“Tell me if it’s too much.”

“Yes,” Neville says and hesitates before continuing. He wants Snape to know though. “I want to feel like you want me so much you can’t control yourself.”

Snape seems like he’s stopped breathing. “I do.”

Neville smiles at him. He feels like that’s all he can do. 

“You are…” Snape starts and then just puts his hands on him, cradles the side of his face and grabs him almost painfully by the arm. He doesn’t finish the sentence. 

Neville kisses him, once on the cheek and then they drop it. Snape keeps his hand on Neville’s arm and the hold doesn’t loosen as he pulls him into the bedroom. They won’t do it now, Neville knows. Today isn’t the time for it, there’s been this softness to the whole day. What Neville wants him to do seems too hard, in every sense of the word.

“I have to get going soon,” Neville says weakly. Snape shakes his head.

“Not yet.”

Neville shrugs off Snape’s robe, underneath he has only his underwear. Snape is fully dressed and as Neville gets comfortable under the covers, he stands up, tidies the room.

“Are you gonna lie down with me or are you gonna keep pacing” Neville asks, stretches out. When Snape says nothing, he smiles, pulls the covers down. “Come on.”

“In a minute,” Snape says, almost smiles back. “You’re being impatient.”

He stops anyway, despite protesting, and sits down on the side of the bed. Neville pulls at his clothes until Snape gives in and lies down. Everything feels quiet, calm.

“What do you like? About sleeping with me?”

“We don’t sleep together. Call it what it is,” he says, harshly. Like always.

Neville frowns. Snape is above the covers, so he pulls them off himself, gets up on his knees and looks at him. “Fucking me, then. Having sex with me.”

“I don’t know.” Snape’s hand is slack when Neville picks it up, and he lets him turn it around, look at it. His fingers are long and thin. 

“Charmer,” Neville says, kisses at Snape’s palm. When Snape doesn’t elaborate, Neville pushes. “There’s gotta be something?”

Snape leans his head against the headboard, closes his eyes. His fingers curl inward towards his palm and Neville lets him move his hand away. After a while he says a quiet, “Sure.”

“What?” Neville continues. “What’s the turn on? In like, people you sleep with?”

Snape doesn’t respond for a few moments, then talks slowly and steadily. He still has his eyes closed. “I don’t know. Submission, probably.”

“You like to have sex with me because I’m submissive?”

Snape opens his eyes at that, looks at his own hand in Neville’s wider, rougher ones. “No. No, with you it’s… It’s that I’m able to-“ he starts and then seems to trail off, searching for what to say. His fingers twitch, just once, almost unnoticeably. “It’s that you let me. That you willingly let me… There’s power in that. You give me power.” 

Snape won’t look him in the eyes. It’s sad, what he’s said. Or maybe not, maybe whatever makes Neville’s insides ache isn’t sadness. 

“So it’s power? All of it?” he asks, and Snape pulls his hand back. 

“No. No,” he just says, and doesn’t elaborate until Neville smiles at him, can’t help himself. “You’re kind.”

“I’m nice? And that’s hot?” Neville asks, would laugh if it weren’t for the intense look in Snape’s eyes.

“Kindness isn’t niceness,” Snape says. Neville wants to roll around in the tone of his voice, like he rolls around in the sheets sometimes to be able to smell Snape on him, for however brief. “You’re unconditionally compassionate. You’re gentle.”

“Thank you?” Neville tilts his head, watches Snape’s unreadable face.

“Don’t say that. It’s not a good thing.” Snape looks reluctant to say it but his voice is calm and clear. 

“It doesn’t make me weak,” Neville says, feels as calm and clear as Snape sounds.

Snape shakes his head and Neville is sure he’s going to get angry, but then he seems to deflate, looks at Neville and the lines of his face are soft, smooth. “Maybe not.”

He thinks Snape is different. He feels different, sounds different. Neville wants to tell him he’s gentle too, that he’s can be gentle too. That the right thing to say isn’t ‘maybe not’, it’s no, definitely not. People calling him gentle isn’t something he’s ever felt ashamed of. It doesn’t mean that he can’t do the things that have to be done. It means he chooses to be better than the Carrows, than Bellatrix Lestrange. Better than Snape. 

He doesn’t say any of those things, because Snape touches him then, pulls him closer and pushes his mouth against his neck. His mouth is soft, and wet, and gentle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked the read, I'm getting to the end of this fic now, and I hope you'll enjoy these last few chapters!


	14. Chapter Fourteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a warning just to be sure: some rape play in this chapter, very consensual, pretty short and pretty vaguely described.

Summer is almost there. Outside, the grass and trees are a beautiful lush green, and the air smells like warm pine and dry dirt. Neville still has detention, with Hagrid in the woods and when he walks in the shade of the sprawling tree tops, Neville thinks of Emily, of her lying in the sun and the smell of her warm skin, her smile. He does that sometimes, can’t help himself. It feels almost like being unfaithful, now, but then he has to tell himself he’s being ridiculous. In reality, he wouldn’t want anyone else than Snape. 

It feels so weird that it has somehow gone full circle and become normal. He doesn’t think about it unless he forces himself to, how strange it is that he feels this way about Snape, of all people. What he feels is strangely fitting to who he feels it for. It’s confusing, not quite love, not quite as soft as it should be. 

While things with Snape just seem to get better and better, things at school get worse. The Carrows are allowed more and more leeway. Some of the older Slytherin students join the DA. After Neville shuts down the inevitable protests, mainly from the Gryffindors, there’s only the crushing fact that now even the Slytherins feel unsafe. At least the Slytherins that might not be fully pureblood, at least the Slytherins that, well, have a reason to be afraid, for themselves or for others.

It’s getting unbearable, being followed everywhere, being watched by the Carrows, by the Death Eaters they’ve now posted throughout the school, the few pupils that have decided to join. He feels watched, always. Even at Snape’s now, he feels like at any time someone might barge in, drag him off and throw him in a room somewhere to rot. He has nightmares, about Luna, about Ginny. About his grandmother. They’re all moving their mouths, talking to him, but no sound comes out, not a single sound. They get angrier and angrier about it, and Neville thinks he will never hear their voices again. He can’t remember them. 

Snape seems nervous too. Agitated. They both know something is coming. As Neville goes to class, prepares for his exams, it feels like none of it matters. McGonagall tries to get them to care, but no one does. What good is it trying to get good grades now? What good is it trying to get a good job? Neville knows that it won’t matter. Nothing will matter. He will have to keep doing this, keep fighting. 

He spends most of his free time training the DA - they’re getting good now, so good that Neville feels a warmth blooming in his chest that he thinks might be pure pride. Other times he goes down to the greenhouses. He learns all the plants good for healing, good for energy, for the enormous pressure of this dark cloud following him around. Of course, he learns how to weaponize them too. It’s incredible what you can accomplish with dirt and seeds and water. The Room of Requirement keeps getting more and more permanent residents, keeps expanding to fit more and more scared kids. That’s how Neville feels, like he keeps expanding, to fit everything. He’s stretching out too thin, feels like it’s only a matter of time before he snaps, like a rubber band, like a balloon.

The only real time he feels relaxed, like things aren’t going to suddenly flood him, is when Snape corners him in his office, pushes him down against the desk and starts to undress him, almost violently. He’s careful and hesitant at first, Neville can tell he wants to ask him if it’s alright, but Neville pushes at him, claws at his arms, up his neck. 

“It’s fine, I want it,” he mumbles, almost whispers, and he can feel the air leave Snape’s body, in one long push. 

He fights him so much that they end up on the floor, Snape grabbing him, rutting into him, and then moving inside him. Neville relaxes, eventually, can’t move, can only hear Snape’s breathing become more rapid, can only feel his hands on him holding him down. He’s face down, has trouble breathing since he’s pressed against the floor, Snape’s body weight holding him down. It feels like his feelings being made physical, all this intangible darkness he carries around, just coming into being. And it’s harmless. It’s just Snape. Snape who wouldn’t ever hurt him for real. 

They come together, at the same time, Snape reaching around him to jerk him off in time with the grinding of his hips. It’s the first time they’ve done that, ever. 

Afterwards, Snape pulls out of him, lies down next to him and Neville feels relief. He feels so incredibly light, like he could run all the way down to his dorm and not even break a sweat.

“How was that?” Snape asks, his breathing still rough. He’s staring up at the ceiling, looking a little lost. 

“Thank you. That was… great. So great.” Neville says and when he turns to look at him properly he can see the red stripes on Snape’s neck. “Oh, God, sorry!”

Snape looks alarmed, just a slight widening of his eyes, and pushes off from the floor, leans on his elbows. “What?”

“I scratched you,” Neville says, reaches out and runs his hands along the agitated skin on his neck. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to. I got carried away.”

Snape laughs, a long and bitter and shocked laugh. “That’s what you’re worried about.”

“I asked you to do this,” he says, and Snape lets him touch him, doesn’t pull away. He thinks that’s a win. 

“You’re bleeding too,” Snape says, brushes the back of his hand against Neville’s arm, where Neville now notices the marks Snape has left on him. Small, small crescents from where Snape’s nails have dug into his skin. 

“Oh,” Neville breathes, runs his fingers over the spots that will most surely bruise. 

Snape starts to get up, shakily, and then turns and holds out a hand. “Are you alright?”

“I’m fine. Really. It was really good. You were really good,” Neville says, smiles. “It was all I wanted.”

“Good,” Snape says and hesitates. 

“It’s okay if you don’t want to do that again,” Neville says, slowly. “I get it.”

Snape looks as close to relieved as he gets and when he talks it’s very levelled. “Not anytime soon.”

Neville gets it. It was intense. He’d like to do it again, maybe, but not anytime soon, no. They sit on the sofa together, Neville trying and failing to put his clothes back on with shaking hands. He’s starting to come down from it now, wants more to lie down than go running. He can feel the pain now, vivid and loud. When he sits down, his shirt only half-buttoned, Snape reaches out for him and he ducks away from his hand. 

“No, not now. Sorry, I just… I just need to sit here for a bit.”

Snape nods. “When you want to.”

He’s more mature about it than Neville thought. He’d fought that at first, calling Snape immature. Maybe a better description would be to say he gets stuck in his own head a lot. Runs circles around himself. Snape thinks a lot about himself. Anyway, Neville had thought he’d make things complicated, but he’s being very, well, mature.

Snape gives him space, lets him sit on the sofa however long he wants, gives him a cup of tea. He gets up and shuffles some papers on his desk, comes back and sits down, idly scribbles notes on a scroll he’s laid out across his knees. Eventually Neville falls asleep like that, listening to the rasp of Snape’s quill against the paper. 

\--

Neville disappears before they can talk again. 

Severus almost goes crazy when he hears. The Carrows come crawling up to his office, tell him some story about how Neville disrupted class, was violent, stormed out. Now they don’t know where he is, he hasn’t showed up at dinner, he hasn’t been to class, he hasn’t been sleeping in his dorm. Severus doesn’t hesitate for a second before he dives into Alecto’s mind. She’s an animal, she has no defences. Too much of a pathetic imbecile. She doesn’t notice a thing, wouldn’t even if she knew what to look for. As Severus slides into the sewer pit of her mind he feels like a knife, slicing into something disgustingly soft, like porridge. He’s so very angry. 

He watches what happened, through her eyes, and doesn’t move a muscle. He watches her torture a Ravenclaw student, use the Cruciatus curse. And of course Neville objects to that. Of course he does, that stupid boy. She doesn’t see Neville until he’s already to his feet, shouting at her. Then he throws a curse at her, misses her head by a millimetre, hits the wall behind her which bursts into flames for a second. Then chaos, Carrow trying to hit him back, Neville trying to get to the exit. He slides out of her thoughts and into his office again. 

He waits until they’ve left, of course, to react. Oh, he shows anger, of course. That they let him go, that they didn’t enforce those disciplinary actions they’re so fond of. That he tells them, tries to communicate through the tone of his voice that yes, he would like them dead. He would enjoy it.

He can’t do anything. He can’t send an owl, he can’t find him himself, he can’t send someone else, he can’t ask anyone. The only one he can think to ask about where Neville is, is Seamus Finnigan, and he can’t think of one reason why the boy would talk to him at all. 

He stays missing for more than a week. It’s not the longest they’ve gone without seeing one another, but Severus has at least known where he is then. He tries not to think about it. He really truly tries. 

It doesn’t help that there’s nothing else going on. No schemes, no meetings, nothing. It’s worrying. Usually he hears from the Malfoys at least, gets a letter from Narcissa or talks to Draco, but there’s nothing from their side either. It’s worrying. There is nothing to do but think. Oh, how he thinks. 

He walks the grounds in the evenings and nights, him and the ghosts. There are no students out after curfew, and at most he stumbles upon a member of staff out doing the same as him, or a bumbling junior Death Eater on watch. None of them talk to him, other than a startled greeting. He walks up to the owlery, down to the dungeons or to the lake. This night, under a clear sky full of stars, he walks down to the greenhouses, down to the plants Neville may or may not have touched, taken care of, nourished. 

He stands outside the glass door, looks in at them. It feels, after a while, as if the plants are breathing with him, following his slow inhale and exhale, pulsing. He watches and then withdraws into the shadows, back into the castle and to his sterile quarters.

When he gets there, Neville is waiting for him. Instead of his dark and empty bed there is a warm body, wrapped tightly in his sheets. It’s such a blessing Severus thinks he might be imagining it first. It’s not until Neville opens his eyes, awoken by the noise of him entering, and smiles at him, that he realises it’s real. He couldn’t imagine something like that. 

“I let myself in, I hope that’s okay? You told me your password, remember?”

He’d forgotten. Another thing he shouldn’t have told him, another dangerous fact he’s given him. “Where have you been?”

“I… I don’t think I can tell you.” His voice is groggy from sleep and he sounds rough. Like it’s been rough. 

What if Severus simply locks him in here? What if he won’t let him leave? He wouldn’t be hurt up here, in the tower, in Severus’ bed. 

He starts towards him, wants to touch him, wants to feel him be solid, made out of flesh and blood. When he reaches the bed Neville leans towards him, like an animal starved for touch. His arms come up around Severus’ shoulders, around his neck. He embraces him back, hugs him against him, breathes in his smell. 

“I’m sorry if I worried you,” Neville says as they break apart. “I just…”

“I heard from the Carrows,” Severus gets out. He doesn’t want to let him go. “I don’t blame you.”

“I’m fine, anyway. I’m fine.”

He says it twice, and when Severus pulls away, he can see that the boy is looking at him with a searching expression, like he’s gauging Severus’ reaction. That he would care and adjust what he’s saying to fit Severus, to make sure Severus isn’t upset. It angers him. Then he smiles again, presses a kiss to Severus’ cheek. 

“Come lie down with me. I missed you,” Neville says and starts to undress him. He pulls at the fabric, gets two or three buttons open, until he exclaims quietly, “How… How do you unbutton this? How is this layered?” 

Severus takes over, does it right, and soon he’s out of his robes, his shirt, his trousers. He lies down under the sheets, lets Neville climb all over him, settle into the crook of his arm, pressed against him. 

“Please tell me where you were,” Severus says into his hair. 

Neville is quiet for a long time, from this angle Severus can’t see his face, and then finally he says, “Fine. Yeah. I’m staying in the Room of Requirement. Me and a few others. But I can’t tell you how to get there.”

Severus nods. Still technically in the school. That’s good. 

Neville pushes himself up now, turns to look at him. “It was the strangest thing. I… I wanted to see you, and it opened up a door. To right outside your office. I was worried about walking up through the halls, you know with the Carrows and everything. If they caught me, they’d, well, it wouldn’t be good. Anyway, I wanted to see you so bad, and then there it was, a door just beside my bunk, and it led me through this tunnel, in the walls I think and then I was right outside your office.”

Neville keeps touching him, keeps talking animatedly. It’s endearing. 

“I think I’ve figured out how it works too. The door disappeared when I walked out of it, but I think I can, I think there’s a brick to touch and it’ll open again. I can walk back, later, without anyone seeing me. It did that before too, when we needed food, and… I can’t, I probably can’t tell you, but it’s really amazing. We wanted food and it made a tunnel for us and now we have food. Not very good, but hey.”

Severus kisses him. Mostly, he tells himself, so he will shut up, but probably because he wants to taste him. He presses against him, bites his lip so hard that the boy pulls away, looks at him with large eyes. “I don’t care,” Severus tells him. “You don’t have to tell me.”

Severus leans his forehead against Neville’s, closes his eyes. He wants to shout at him, swear, curse him. Instead, he clutches one hand in the sheets, the other in Neville’s hair. 

“God.” The word slips through his lips unwanted and neither of them acknowledge it. Severus is going to be ripped apart. This horrible, horrible feeling in the pit of his stomach. 

After a few moments, Neville pulls away. “How are you?” he asks and Severus doesn’t know what to say. 

He can’t pinpoint the exact reason he’s reacting this way. It might be that the Dark Lord seems to have found the wand, one third of the Deathly Hallows. Along with the warmth, with the greenery and spring, has come the realisation that this is going to amount to something. It might just be that Neville is so soft, so warm. Or it’s that he has decided now, not to fight it. There’s no point.

“Fine,” he says, instead of spilling these things that Neville doesn’t need to hear.

“Okay, if you say so,” Neville says and leans back against his chest again. “Is it okay if I sleep a bit?” 

“I need to talk to you,” Severus says but he doesn’t move away from him. 

“We can talk later, right? I’m just going to take a little nap,” he mumbles and Severus doesn’t answer. Yes. Neville doesn’t wait for an answer either, is already almost asleep, and burrows his head into Severus’ chest. His breathing, slowly, evens out and his limbs turn heavy. They lie like that for quite some time.

After a while, he shifts, turns to lie with his face away from him, curled up in half a ball with his back and legs and ass pressed against Severus instead. He touches him. He can’t help it. In sleep, he looks even more vulnerable, even more naked. He is naked. 

Severus slides his fingers over his thighs, his waist. He’s thinner now than he was all those months ago. It doesn’t fit him, he should be round, he should look less shrunken. Severus supposes it’s stress, and the Carrows’ food punishments. He wants to see him well-fed, and laughing, and not so afraid. 

He’s shamefully hard, just from touching him like this, almost innocently. The heaviness of his limbs, the ownership he feels for him.

“Neville?” he tries, but he just frowns slightly in his sleep, pushes up against him. Probably just instinctively seeking out his body heat. 

He kisses at his shoulder, watches for a reaction. He gets none, except maybe a twitch of the lip. He continues sleeping, his mouth open slightly. 

“Wake up,” he murmurs, as he presses his face into the back of his head, into his hair. He lets his hand stroke up his chest, touch the sparse hair there, move downward. He rests his hand on his hipbone and when he breathes his chest expands to press against Neville’s back. He wants to fuck him so badly. 

He presses into his hip and gets no reaction. He presses his entire pelvis into him, his dick grinding into his ass almost painfully and then slowly rolls his hips. Nothing. 

“You’re awake. Although, kudos on faking it so well,” he says quietly into his ear, and Neville smiles, slightly, just a tug of his lips. 

He keeps his eyes closed even as he speaks, murmurs out a, “Thank you.”

He tugs at him now, turns him around, and Neville can’t hold onto the last bits of pretend.

As he places one hand on Severus’ chest, he says, “I was asleep for a bit, you know, before I woke up to your hands all over me. You have very poor impulse control.”

“Absolutely. Poor impulse control. Poor moral compass,” Severus murmurs, kisses him. “Sexual deviancy.”

Neville sucks in a breath as he bites down on his neck, moves downwards lazily. His hand runs up his thigh and Neville laughs, his legs falling open, inviting. 

“Don’t forget how gloomy you are,” he says, breathily and lies back against the pillows. Severus laps at his chest, shapes his tongue around his nipple and sucks. 

“That too,” says, licks his lips and keeps his eyes on the skin closest to his face, the soft curves of Neville’s stomach.

“A gloomy sexual deviant,” Neville murmurs to himself. “You’re really quite rude, too. A rude deviant.”

Severus takes his mouth of him for a second. “For someone in your position, you’re not very grateful.”

Neville laughs, a bright chuckle, which fades as Severus bows his head, takes all of him into his mouth. “Sorry. Oh, God, mm, sorry.”

He works at the head, holds the rest of his dick in his hand and squeezes, and when his spit dribbles down he uses it to jerk him off, slowly. He looks up at Neville, meets a focused frown and open mouth and then ducks his head down again, sucks until his cheeks hollow. 

“Ah, God, you gotta stop,” Neville says and Severus keeps going. “You gotta stop.”

Neville brings his hands down now, pulls at his hair, and Severus finally stops, gives him what he wants. 

“I want you to fuck me. I want to come with you in me,” he says, unashamed. Severus wants to swallow him whole. He wants to keep working on him with his mouth, with his hands, until he comes and then not stop, just keep going until he wrings orgasm after orgasm out of him, until he has worked him raw.

Instead though, he leans up to kiss him, and then shifts so that he’s lying down on his back. He pulls off his underwear as he moves, and then is faced with Neville’s large eyes, his unsure face, blushing from the heat or the tension or his excitement.

“Sit,” Severus says and when Neville doesn’t move he puts his hand on his arm. “On my lap.”

As Neville moves, he reaches for the lube in the bedside table. 

“I…I don’t really know what to do,” Neville says, so close to his own face. “We haven’t, I mean, I haven’t done it like this before.”

Something inside Severus’ stomach flips. It takes him a moment to be able to say to him that it’s fine, that it’ll be fine, but eventually he does. He tells him it’s easy. 

“Yeah?” he says, face so close Severus feels each word as a puff of air against his lips. “Do you promise not to get mad if I’m not very good at it?”

“Of course,” Severus says. “Do you think you can…?”

He offers him the bottle of lube, and Neville takes it hesitantly. “Alright,” he says, sounds brave. He’s so very brave.

He slicks up his fingers, reaches behind himself and makes a noise, like he wants to tell Severus he can’t, like he wants to tell him it’s too embarrassing. 

“You look so beautiful,” Severus says. “Let me look at you.”

Neville smiles the tiniest bit, leans back. Severus can’t see it, but he can tell by the look on his face that he has worked at least one finger into himself, maybe two. 

“Tell me when you’re ready,” Severus breathes, finding it hard to concentrate. He wants to throw him down on the bed, fuck him senseless without preparation, and the craziest thing about it is that he knows that Neville would let him. 

“I think I’m-“ Neville starts, and Severus interrupts him. 

“You’re alright,” he says, his hands on Neville’s hips. “Ready?”

He nods, doesn’t say anything. At all. That should make him nervous maybe. Make him want to stop. It doesn’t.

He pulls him upwards, lets him get up properly on his knees, and then positions him. He lets go to hold himself steady. 

As Neville lowers himself down Severus can tell he’s holding his breath, not breathing out until Severus is in him all the way to the root. Then he does, releasing one huge breath, deflating. He’s shaking. 

He lets out a nervous laugh. “Okay, now what?”

“Move. Up. Roll your hips,” Severus answers him in clipped sentences. He can’t get out much more. 

Neville does, hesitantly, lifts himself up, his thighs tense. He leans down, puts his hand next to Severus’ head. 

“Like this, it’s almost like-like it’s the other way around. Like I’m fucking you,” he says, smiles. And Severus rearranges his legs so that he can thrust upwards, just once, hard, making Neville stutter out an, “Oh. Oh. M-maybe not.”

Severus thinks he might not ever have been as happy as this. Not pure happiness. As he watches Neville fuck himself, slowly roll his hips and wrap one hand around his own dick, more and more sure of himself and what he’s doing, Severus’ mind wanders. He doesn’t think he’s ever felt like this. Easy to say in the situation he’s in, but still. Highlights in his personal life, or professional for that matter, have never felt like this. Other people’s hands on him have never felt like this, but it’s more. He enjoys watching Neville be confident. He revels in seeing him happy. He remembers pushing him around all those months ago, all those years ago, remembers thinking he was meek. He’s not. Doing this is an honour. Neville is an honour Severus doesn’t think he deserves. 

When Neville’s movements stutter, Severus pulls him down again, kisses him softly and pushes his hand out of the way so he can be the one to slowly wring his orgasm out of him. As he comes he tenses up around Severus and his own orgasm arrives only moments after, and it’s the most beautiful thing. 

\--

Snape seems awfully serious, even for him. Neville has missed that. He knows it’s silly but he’s missed all of him. More than usual. Maybe it’s that he’s felt something coming, like a foul smell in the air. Maybe that’s what it is. 

Neville lies and waits for Snape to come back from the bathroom and when he doesn’t, he gets up, pulls his underwear on and heads out into the rest of the rooms. He finds Snape in the kitchen, standing by his kitchen table, looking at something. 

“Sit down,” he says, gestures to the sofa in the living room. “Put something else on.”

Neville laughs, but he’s nervous now. They’ve consciously made the choice not to talk about the war, working with the belief that the less you know the less you can tell others, the less others can torture out of you, but now Snape is so serious that Neville thinks something might have happened to change that. Maybe he wants him to help? Help him do whatever Dumbledore wanted him to do? 

Neville isn’t stupid, he knows Snape must have a more concrete plan than just help Harry. He knows Dumbledore must have told both Harry and Snape something else. 

He comes back into the living room with his shirt and trousers on, and buttons up as he sits down next to Snape on the sofa. “What is it?”

“I…” Snape starts. He seems to give up on explaining, just leans over to the table in front of the sofa and pushes a stack of papers towards Neville. 

“What’s this?” 

The papers look serious as well, lots of fine print and lots and lots of text. 

“It’s my will,” Snape says and at that Neville shifts his gaze back to Snape. He looks tired. Old. He also looks like he won’t accept any fuzz about it. Like he wants Neville to pretend that this is just a normal conversation to have. 

“Why… Why are you showing me your will?” Neville asks, but he knows. He’s not stupid. 

“I wanted to make sure you knew what is going to happen when I-“

“Nope. No,” Neville says, shakes his head.

“I’m giving some of my belongings to the Malfoys. Most of it goes to you-“

“I don’t want it,” Neville says, maybe a bit too heated, and Snape drills into him with those dark eyes.

“That’s fine. You can sell all of it if you want to, might get-“

“Why are you doing this now?”

“Stop interrupting me,” Snape hisses. “Please.”

Neville swallows, leans forward onto his knees. He can’t look at him right now. He knows why he’s doing it, really. They both feel it, they both know. 

“I’m giving you the house,” Snape says.

“I’ve never even been there. I’ve never even seen it,” Neville says, shakes his head. He can’t believe it. 

“Please just listen,” Snape says and Neville looks over at him again.

“No. No, I’m not going to listen to you talk like you’re going to die.”

Snape is quiet, reaches out a hand to him. Neville looks at it and then gives in, moves closer on the sofa, on his knees next to him. He leans his face against the stretched out hand and Snape strokes his cheek and then hold his jaw in a gentle grip.

“I’m going to die,” he says and when Neville starts protesting he just continues to talk, louder. “I’m going to die. Some day. And when it happens, you should be taken care of.”

It’s sweet, in a twisted way. Neville feels like Snape has asked him to marry him, but in the worst possible way he could have. ‘Some day’ is a stupid thing to say. You don’t write up your will like this if you don’t think you’re going to die soon. A normal person doesn’t do that. 

“I have money. Money isn’t a problem. I don’t need your, your belongings or whatever.”

“Don’t be a child,” Snape says and then seems to regret it, shakes his head just the tiniest bit. “I’m sorry.”

It’s a sweet gesture. Neville will try to focus on that bit. 

“Who else would I give it to? It’s not a nice house, it’s run down and in a bad neighbourhood. The Malfoys don’t want it and they have enough money, more money than you. I don’t have any family left, other than muggles I’ve never met. It makes sense,” Snape says, quietly. “It would make me happy.”

Neville’s resistance thaws. As always. “Fine.”

Snape looks pleased, as pleased as he can look with that grim face. “Good. I’ve already signed it. Everything is already done.”

Neville laughs. “Asshole. Of course it is.”

Does he have no one else? Is that really true? Is Neville that big of a part of his life?

“You love me,” Neville says, tries it out. “You’re doing this because you love me.”

As Neville creeps closer, Snape frowns angrily out into the room. When Neville puts his hand on his knee, he nods to himself. “Yes. I do.”

Neville laughs, teasingly. “You love me,” he says in a sing-song voice, presses a kiss to Snape’s cheek. “You’re massively in love with me.”

Snape grabs his wrists just as he’s about to place them on Snape’s shoulders and pull him closer. His grip is hard and his eyes too. Neville keeps smiling. “I love you too,” Neville says, and the grip changes, into something softer.

“You’re an idiot,” Snape says and Neville smiles. 

“Don’t die though,” Neville says into the crook of his neck. “You keep telling me to be less nice, more selfish. I’m trying to be selfish now. I don’t care what happens, you just can’t die.”

He can’t see Snape when he talks with his head on his shoulder like this, but he can hear him and he can feel the rumble inside his chest. “I promise,” he says. 

This is the last conversation they have before the battle, and it’s what Neville thinks about when he hears Harry is back, when he knows in his gut that there is going to be a culmination of all this darkness. He remembers thinking ‘what great timing’, as he hurries through the school halls, watches his people rally around Harry and fight. 

Neville thinks about it as he swings the sword of Gryffindor, the real one this time, and slices off the head of a snake. When he stands in front of Voldemort, covered in Snape’s blood, this is what he thinks of, Snape’s soft grip on his wrists and the look on his face. He hears Snape’s voice in his head, those exact words, over and over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked it! next chapter is the last chapter! we're almost over the finish line!


	15. Chapter Fifteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So so sorry that this chapter was so late!

Chapter Fifteen

Severus wakes up in a hospital bed. 

The first thing he is aware of is the pain, and then the light shining in through the curtains, a bright happy spring light. When his eyes get used to it, he can see out the window, out into the street, can see the trees in the yard of St Mungo’s. 

It takes him a few tries to sit up, the pain in his neck and shoulder glaring when he tries to move, but in the end he does it and looks around. In the bed next to him, there’s a non-moving shape wrapped in covers, bunched in on itself. 

He’s alive. He’s alive. 

To be honest, he hadn’t thought he’d be. He’d thought he would repay his debt to Lily, to Albus and then he’d be finished. Really, what else was there to do? 

Oh, Potter. He swings his legs over the bed now, finds he’s wearing a white hospital gown that keeps bunching together around his knees, annoyingly. He stands, on shaky legs. He remembers very little. He remembers the battle, the fighting, very vaguely. And Voldemort, of course, he remembers that. The Shrieking Shack, the snake. He remembers the worry. Then nothing. 

Somehow, as he walks on unsteady legs towards the door of the room, it feels like being reborn. A new chance, a new life. But, as he’s learnt, life is a master of surprising him with bad outcome after bad outcome. 

He finds a healer in the hallway, a young woman with blonde hair in a neat bun, who hurries over to him, chides him like he’s a child. He shouldn’t be out of bed, she says. Nerve damage, she says. Snake bite, she says. Severus barely listens. Neville Longbottom, he says. List of casualties, he says. The Dark Lord, he says. 

She makes him crawl into bed again, without any answers, and he thinks she must have given him a potion because he feels himself slipping back into sleep. 

When he wakes up again, the healer is gone and Minerva is there. This is something like the second conversation he’s had with her in months, the last one being their confrontation in the Great Hall during the battle. She looks tense, her lips pressed tightly together.

“Severus,” she says. He notices that the shape in the bed next to him is gone and wonders if they’ve moved or if they’ve died. Or if Minerva simply demanded privacy. 

He says nothing, only sits up straighter in his bed. He dislikes her seeing him like this. Weak, unprotected. He feels as bleached out as this hospital room, white and stark and cottony. His head isn’t clear enough for this conversation. 

“I don’t quite know where to start,” Minerva says. “We seem to have a lot to discuss.”

“What day is it? How long…?” he tries to say, and his voice is just a croak. He tries again, gets it out with some difficulty. The pain flares up, just as it did before. He tryingly moves his neck, brings a hand up to his throat. There’s a mass of puckered skin, tender to the touch, that stretches from one side of his neck down to his shoulder. 

“You’ve been unconscious in one form or another for several weeks,” Minerva says. “How much have the healers told you?”

“Nothing,” Severus gets out. “Nothing. Not even… How did the battle…?”

“We won,” Minerva says and then looks down at her hands resting in his lap. “We suffered casualties, yes. But Voldemort is dead.”

Severus laughs. He catches himself by surprise, didn’t know that he would feel like this. What comes out sounds not entirely like a laugh, more like a mad scratching cough that echoes against the empty walls in this bleak room. He thinks he might cry, both with the pain of the laugh in his broken body and with relief and sorrow and happiness. 

He wants to look at his Dark Mark now, almost pulls the covers up to see. Will it be faded? Will it be gone? He stops himself at the last minute and looks up at Minerva, sitting there silently, waiting until he’s finished.

“The boy, Potter, did he…?” he asks, and she nods. 

“He’s alive,” she says. “He sacrificed himself, and somehow... It’s what Albus always planned, isn’t it? That the Harry would sacrifice himself and live?”

Her tone of voice, her face is unreadable. Curiosity, it might simply be curiosity. Although, people are rarely that uncomplicated.

“He didn’t tell me everything. I only knew… I only knew what I needed to.”

She is silent, seems to contemplate that. “I wish… I wish you would have trusted me. You as well as Albus.”

Severus doesn’t know what to say to that. Yes. One can wish a lot of things. Severus knows he wishes a lot of things. 

“How does it feel?” Minerva asks now, nods curtly to his neck. It must look dreadful. 

Severus continues staying quiet, and Minerva brings a hand up to her thin glasses, pushes them up her nose. She squints out the window, where the sky is a dark orange. She continues looking out the window as she speaks. 

“You owe a lot to Harry Potter,” she says. “Him and his friends. They saved your life. Granger, of course, stopped the bleeding, took you up to the castle.”

“I don’t remember any of it. I believe you.” 

“And Neville Longbottom, of course, is really the one you owe your life to,” she says, and now she turns back to him, watches his face closely. “He knew you carried around antivenom in your breast pocket.”

Severus’ mouth feels dry, and he might cry, for different reasons this time. Oh, God. 

Minerva speaks again, slowly. “He killed the lousy thing. The snake. Pulled the sword of Gryffindor out of the sorting hat.”

“Is he…?” Severus hoarsely asks.

Minerva purses her lips slightly, just momentarily breaking her composure. 

“Please, Minerva, I-“ he says, doesn’t know how to finish that. I’m sorry? I’m desperate? I don’t know what I’ll do if he’s not alright?

“He’s fine,” she says and something breaks inside of him, some last dark tendril of anger and despair at the world and how unfair it is, it snaps like a cord. It hurts, that he should get to have this, that the world can be this good. 

He’s fine. He says it out loud again in this wreck of a voice, “He’s fine?” and Minerva looks at him with an expression full of conflicting emotions. 

“He’s fine. He hasn’t been notified yet, that you’re awake, but I suppose he’ll be here first thing tomorrow morning,” she says. “He’s come to see you every other day, they’ve told me.”

“Thank you,” he says, to her, to Neville, to whatever or whoever gave him this. 

“He was a source of pride during the battle. During the entire last year,” she says fiercely, still watching him intently. Severus swallows.

“Yes. I know,” he says, his voice breaking at the last word, a painful cough starting low in his chest. He knows.

She keeps speaking slowly, like she’s trying to level herself out, like what she really wants is to shout at him. Maybe turn into her Animagus form and scratch him, eat him up like a rat. He doesn’t blame her. She doesn’t do any of those things, just speaks slowly and hands him the glass of water standing on the night stand.

“I don’t know you, Severus. I might have thought I did but I never have, I’ve realised,” she says, takes a deep breath and continues quietly. “I’ve never pretended to know what made Albus have such faith in you and I don’t really have to know.”

“You know me better than most.” Severus tries to talk as clearly as he can.

“I’ve thought you to be an angry, sad child who grew up to be an angry, bitter man. Regardless of your morality, regardless of your allegiances, that’s what I’ve always felt you to be.”

She shows no emotion as she speaks, except for maybe confusion. There’s a wrinkle in the middle of her forehead that grows as she speaks. The sky is turning from orange to pink outside, and soon it will be dark. 

“Maybe this experience, this last year, this war, has changed you? Has it? Are you… Are you a different person?” 

She looks at him like she expects an actual answer. What should he say to that? What is she asking? The pain in his shoulder is throbbing in time with his heartbeat and he closes his eyes. 

He hears her get up. “Well, in the end, it’s not any of my business, I suppose.” 

“Minerva…” he tries and can hear her still her movements. “I…” 

He opens her eyes and looks at her, strains to lean toward her, make this as clear as possible. “I…” he starts again. “I care very deeply for him.”

“Severus Snape wouldn’t say that lightly,” she says, after some consideration.

Severus feels like a child again. Every time he looks at her, he feels to some degree like a child, still in school, still in her classroom. Waiting for class to end so he can sneak off and read, about all the dark things that are possible with power, what dark things he could do with the people throwing hexes after him in the school hallways, the dark things he could do to his father who never knew him or wanted him, to his mother who never cared enough, about anything.

He has always hated that child, but now he feels only pity. 

“No. I wouldn’t,” he says and she nods. Severus looks out through the window and back again, breathes with difficulty. “I don’t know if I can be anything other than what you think me to be. But he makes me want to try. Until I deserve him.”

“A suave answer,” she says.

\--

Severus spends the night pecking at the healers until they give him the answers he wants. He gets a copy of the last few weeks Daily Prophet, complete with a full list of casualties of what they’re calling the Battle of Hogwarts. The list is long. He knows most of the names. Students, Death Eaters. Some, he is happy about, Bellatrix Lestrange, for example. Some names feel unreal, on that list, impossible. Lupin and his wife. Now, all of them are dead. James Potter and his crew. It feels almost unfair, that Severus should be the only one left. Not unfair, maybe. Empty. He has spent such a large part of his life hating these people. What is there to feel now. 

He doesn’t get much sleep. Another healer comes in, talks to him about his injuries. A slit throat, and several snake bites. They tell him he wouldn’t have survived if he hadn’t ingested the antivenom, but that the venom was in his body for so long, allowed to spread for so long that he can expect the effects of it to be severe. They do tests, make him move his arm in circles, up and down. Test his flexibility, his sensation. 

Mostly there’s pain. He feels almost nothing else in his left arm, has trouble lifting it, and has some reduced movement in the left side of his body. They tell him he should be lucky his heart is in as good a shape as it is. 

In the morning, a small man from the Ministry visits him. He talks in a squeaky voice and he tells him about the trial held in his absence, that they need to ask him some questions when he has recovered but that he is largely freed.

That too, feels unfair, empty. He knows powerful people, he supposes that’s it. The other trials are still in process, but his case was apparently shut down by Harry Potter himself. The man from the ministry says the name with reverence, like he’s talking about someone truly great. 

He’s still there when Neville arrives. Severus sees him in the door, locks eyes with him and stops listening to this tiny little man telling him technicalities in that whiny voice. It’s all drowned out, and all he wants is to hear him speak, touch him. He feels as if he can’t be sure he’s really there until he’s actually physically touched him, something that he knows is illogical, somewhere in the back of his mind.

“Excuse me,” he tells the man, gets up with some difficulty and limps off to the end of the room where Neville stands, beaming at him. He can hear the man protest behind him, but how could that possibly matter in this moment. 

When he gets there, finally, he has to lean against the door frame so he can reach his hand out, touch his arm. He’s real. Warm and real and full of blood and muscle and veins.

“Hi,” he says shakily and Severus wants to envelop him, wants to stop him from looking so shaky, so thin and tired. 

Instead of the embrace he had envisioned, it’s more like he leans against him with his whole body, clings to his clothes and his arm. Severus is shaky too, and thin, and tired. 

“I’m sorry I got here so late,” he says into Severus’ shoulder. “I didn’t get the letter until this morning, but I came as soon as I could.” And then the tiny man is behind them, gives a curt little cough and Neville lets out a laugh, says. “Oh, um, yeah, we’re a bit in the way, sorry. Come on.”

And he pulls at him and Severus stumbles off after him. He seems at home here, and it takes Severus too long to understand why, to register that of course he would be, the boy has spent every Christmas here since his first. 

“I know a place,” he says and they step into the elevator, and then they’re alone again and Severus leans into him. He’s attentive, of course he is, shifts so that he’s standing on Severus’ good side, so that he can lean against him more comfortably and Severus can feel his tired, tired body give in to this warmth, this comfort. His smell. His hands, his hair. His eyes. He buries his nose, his whole face clumsily in the crook of Neville’s neck, in his hair. His hand a tight fist in the back of his shirt, holding him upright. He’s all that’s holding him upright. 

They walk out of the elevator and up one more staircase and Neville shimmies open a very sturdy looking door and then they’re on the roof, are met with a view of London from above, can see out over the dirty rooftops and to the tall buildings in the distance. 

“Don’t worry,” he says jokingly, “I talked to the healers before I came in, asked if this would be alright.” When Severus doesn’t answer, he continues. “They say you’re doing really well. Healing really well.”

He sits him down on a bench. There are some chairs and a table there, and Severus thinks this might be where the healers go to eat lunch on a sunny day, sneak off to have a smoke maybe. It doesn’t look like anyone is really supposed to be here, but Neville seems comfortable. He thinks of a smaller Neville, seven maybe, and of course a child that age would find a place like this.

“Is that okay? Are you okay?” Neville asks again and Severus coughs, clears his throat.

“I’m fine,” he says and Neville’s smile falters for just the blink of an eye. “Do I sound that bad?”

“No!” he says. “No, you… Yeah, you sound pretty bad.”

Severus hasn’t even looked in the mirror yet. He wonders what he looks like to him, feels suddenly very conscious of what a wreck he must seem. He pulls the hospital gown down to reveal the wound starting to scar on his neck. “How does it look?”

His facial expression barely changes, but Severus notices. Bad, then. 

“It’s getting better. You looked… When they brought you up from the Shrieking Shack it was… scary. Blood everywhere and you were really pale,” he says quietly. “But it looks like you’re healing now.”

“I don’t remember any of it,” he says, pulls his clothes back in order. 

“No. Good,” he says and then, “Well, I mean.”

“Minerva told me you saved my life.”

He blushes, sweetly. “Well, Hermione is the one who stopped the bleeding. And you’re the one who made the potion, the antidote. I killed the snake though. Brought back the head so they could add the venom to the potion, make the antivenom complete.”

“Thank you,” he says, the sincerest thank you he’s ever uttered. 

“No problem. Really,” he says, looks off awkwardly in the distance. He changes the subject. “Who was that guy down there?” 

Severus can’t connect who he’s talking about at first, but then it clicks. “Someone from the Ministry. I am technically a war criminal seemed to be his point,” he says, watches the way the pale morning sunlight hits Neville’s face. He can’t remember ever seeing him in the light like this? All those meetings at night, or evening, or at any rate lit more by candlelight than this stark sunshine. 

He seems upset now. “No. No, you shouldn’t be. Harry talked to them. You showed him a memory, or something, right?” he rambles, and then more quietly, “They talked to me too. I told them-“

“You shouldn’t have had to do that,” Severus says, almost ashamed. Of what? The emotion doesn’t seem to take well to closer scrutiny.

“It’s fine. I’m not embarrassed,” Neville continues, leans in to talk so that Severus will see he’s serious. 

“What did you tell them?” he asks, and Neville huffs.

“They asked about the ‘nature of our relationship’, as if that’s relevant.” He looks down to his feet, clad in a hospital blue plastic cover.

Severus nods. “What do you… want me to tell them? If they ask?”

He looks startled. “What do you mean? The truth, I guess. Whatever you want to say.”

Minerva made it quite clear that she knew, must have heard from Longbottom himself, or Potter, or someone at the Ministry. The fact that he’s almost certainly fired washes over him. Fine. Not as bad a feeling as he would have thought. Freeing. 

“How are you?” 

He should have asked earlier, but it’s felt overwhelming, seeing him like this. Here. 

He laughs. “I’m fine.” The words come out small and fragile.

“I saw the list of casualties.” Severus’s voice is raspy and broken, and somehow fitting to say these things. 

“Yeah,” Neville mumbles, clears his throat. He leans back against the back of the bench, looks like he’s not sure what to do with his arms, his hands. 

“Your grandmother is alright?” he asks, and Neville nods. 

“Yeah,” he says, too calm. “Yeah, she’s fine. Driving me crazy, but she’s fine.” He laughs again, nervously. “I’m staying with her, right now. The house is a wreck, since she, you know, got attacked and all that, went on the run.”

Severus nods, listens to him talk about his grandmother, about how she makes him go to events, how she yells at the workers restoring the house. He’s more and more relaxed, now, animatedly talking. He sounds like a teenager.

“Come live with me,” he says, interrupts him in the middle of a sentence. 

“What?” he asks, smiles. 

“I have a house. Come stay with me, get away from her for a few months.” He can hear himself, hear the juvenile optimism. 

“You don’t mean that,” he says, shakes his head. 

“If you don’t want to, I-“

“It’s not that. I just…” he leans forward, rests his arms on his knees. When he talks again, he holds his hands out, like that is going to stop Severus from interrupting him. “I’m fine, alright. But, I.. I did to a lot of shit. I killed people. In the battle.”

Severus is quiet for a second. “The killing curse?”

He looks startled. “No. No. But… During the cease fire, I went out to collect the wounded and-and the dead… I mean, they weren’t just on our side. Terrible… Horrible fates, some of which I helped with.”

Severus opens his mouth now, to say that it’s fine, say that he doesn’t care. He hasn’t done anything he should be ashamed of. But Neville shakes his head, vigorously. 

“I’m just saying. I’m not doing too good. I’m not in any state to take care of you.”

“You don’t have to take care of me,” Severus protests. 

“I do though. Look at you,” he says loudly and then, “No, I don’t mean- I didn’t mean it like that. Sorry.”

Severus wants to touch him but doesn’t know if he should. Maybe not. His left arm twitches, the pain flaring up again stemming from the cuts and bites in his shoulder and neck, intense now. Neville doesn’t notice, not until Severus shifts his weight, tucks his arm closer to himself. 

“Shit. Sorry. Sorry,” he says, his hands hovering over Severus’ side. “Do you want to go back down?”

“No,” Severus gets out. “It’ll pass.”

They sit there, not touching each other, watching the sky and the birds. Eventually, the pain subsides, and Severus can stretch out again, carefully move his arm around. He feels feverish and when he swallows, there’s a hard lump in his throat. 

\--

Neville sits there, feels like shit. Not as much shit as Snape looks like, but still shit. He hasn’t been able to sleep for what feels like week. He knows that can’t be true, but that’s only logically. His head understands but his body is screaming out for sleep. He’s so very tired. 

As Snape starts to shake, gets back more of the pigment in his face, he carefully leans into him and on the back of the bench. He hasn’t ever looked this fragile, Neville thinks. He’s seen him angry, yes, naked yes, but this physical weakness he embodies now, that’s new. 

“You wouldn’t have to take care of me,” Snape repeats, finally. His voice now is raspy, sounds like he’s been screaming. When Neville looks at him now, he remembers the blood, all of that blood, and Snape’s pale face. And then the convulsion, the shaking, as all of them just stood there, nothing to do. His frantic fingers searching his coat for the vial he knows must be there and then a blur of Madame Pomfrey asking him what’s in the potion, and him not knowing and her making a guess and saying that they need the venom first, that it won’t work without the venom and Neville feeling warm, hard tears on his face. 

And then the bodies, all of the bodies, people he knew, people he trained. Colin Creevey, Fred Weasley. The broken body they found days later, in the rubble of the bridge. The bridge Neville had torn down. People with marks from vines, of plants Neville had placed in the courtyard. Injuries that he had caused. 

“Severus,” he says. It’s the first time he’s ever said his first name. He thinks, at least. Maybe it’s a combination of the word and this hurt man in front of him that makes it feel new. “I can barely keep myself together right now. Maybe… Maybe not seeing you for a bit would be a good idea.”

“Are you talking about it with a healer?” Snape asks and Neville leans into him as well, lets his tired body slouch back against the bench. 

“Did you hear what I said?” 

Snape ignores him. “You’re getting counselling?”

“Yes, I’m getting counselling,” he says. Some pale-faced healer, talking softly to him about the things you have to do in war, how it’s not his fault. She seems to think that what he and Snape have, had, is something in that category. Maybe it is. Neville doesn’t think it would have happened if things hadn’t been so bad for him, but he could say that about a lot of things. It doesn’t necessarily mean he doesn’t want Snape now. Does it? 

Would it be bad of him, to tell Snape he doesn’t need him anymore? Would it be true? Snape doesn’t seem to want to listen to him say that maybe they should take a break, so really the question doesn’t matter. 

They’re both so broken and tired that Neville thinks they might fall asleep if they stay there any longer. Sitting silently next to him, Neville feels his body warmth seep in through his own clothes. This feels the same, doesn’t it? 

“I…” Snape says with that raspy voice, and Neville takes his hand. Snape looks down at their hands, intertwined. “I promised you I’d live.”

“Yes.” Neville tries to smile. “I’m glad you did.”

“I…” he starts and trails off. Neville knows what he wants to say, doesn’t have to hear it. He squeezes the hand, gently. 

\--

Seamus is the one who seems the most alright with it. Or most alright talking to Neville about it. Neville hasn’t seen Ginny other than at the funerals, and with Luna it hasn’t mattered. With Luna, they’ve always talked about something else, or not talked at all. Sitting quietly with Luna’s form next to him on her sofa, has been the only peaceful thing in the last month. Seamus and Dean have become this annoying couple, talking constantly about the apartment they’re buying, their furniture, their new china. Not that they’ve said they’re a couple, but Neville draws his conclusions. He never sees them kiss, but they touch each other in small ways that feel so familiar that Neville is baffled that someone could be blind to it. 

They sit down in a muggle coffee shop when Snape is still asleep, kept in what the healers call a magical coma. Neville doesn’t really know what that means, but he has no other choice but to trust them. He trusts them, he’s just worried.

Seamus looks good. Better than he has in months. He tells him Dean wanted to come but couldn’t, had some family thing, and then immediately leans forward over his drink and says, “So… Snape, then?”

It’s the first time anyone has brought it up. Not even his grandmother has asked him this directly. He guesses she will, when she has a little less to do. Everyone else seems nervous to ask, scared that he’ll be upset. But it fits this conversation, it fits with Seamus’ grin and how he talks about Dean. It feels like gossip, like normal life.

“Yeah,” Neville says, smiles into his coffee. What else is he supposed to do? When Seamus continues to grin at him, waiting, he shrugs. “I don’t know.”

“Come on, Neville,” Seamus says. “Give me some more information?”

“I, um…” Neville says, trails off. He huffs out a breath. He didn’t think this would be so hard to talk about. He’s wanted to tell people for so long, has thought it would be easier if he could tell people. Right now, though, he just feels like he wants to crawl into bed, not talk to anyone anymore.

“I mean… It’s… It’s good, right? You’re not, like…” he trails off and it takes Neville a minute to understand what he’s asking. If he was willing, right, that’s what the question is. 

“Oh.” He raises his eyebrows, hurries to spit the words out. “Yeah. Yeah.”

The outlandishness of that question, that he has to ask it. That no one else has asked it, too. 

“Okay, then. Good.” He takes a sip of his drink and seems like he might drop the subject but then leans forward again. “Neville, how the fuck did that happen? I’m sorry, but, how the fuck?”

Neville laughs. Harder than he has in forever. “Yeah. That is the question isn’t it.”

Seamus sputters into his cup of coffee, rumbles out a laugh too, but doesn’t ask him again, doesn’t press him. 

“I guess it just happened. I mean, I didn’t mean to. I don’t think he meant to either.”

“To what… extent…” Seamus starts and Neville apparently makes a face, because Seamus huffs out a surprised, “Oh. Okay. All year?”

Neville nods. 

“Okay, yeah, wow. Dean thought maybe people got it wrong, but you know, I saw those bite marks,” he says and then frowns to himself. “Now that I think about it, can we just not talk about it?”

“Yeah,” Neville says, lets out a big breath. “Yes, please.”

And that’s it. He’d thought it would be worse than that. But of course, there are a lot more people to talk to and at some point, the awkwardness of asking will disappear. 

Now, after Snape is awake, a few days after he gets that curt letter and drops everything and heads to the hospital, he goes to see Harry. Neville has seen him in counselling of course, but they haven’t really had a conversation. Not since after the battle, with the bodies and the destruction and the long long hours of cleaning up. And the funerals of course. He knows he’s been to the Ministry, to speak on Snape’s behalf, but they haven’t talked to each other. 

The Weasleys are a wreck. When Neville arrives, to see Harry, he can feel it in the air. Their house, the few times he’s been there, has always been full of life, always been exactly what his grandmother’s house wasn’t. Fred’s death hit them hard. Most of all Percy, finally living back home again. All of them are living back home. Harry as well, sharing a room with Ginny, or Ron, depending who you ask. 

Hermione is nowhere to be seen. He tries to ask Ron about it and he tells him something about her parents, about how she’s gone on a trip. Neville can’t really make sense of it but he’s learnt by now not to ask. It’s strange and familiar, all at the same time. Neville has lived with this his whole life, being the one no one wants to ask about and now it’s everyone. It’s comfortable for him, in a way it isn’t for a lot of the others.

Mrs Weasley makes him tea, smiles gently at him as he waits for Harry to get back from whatever meeting he has. She murmurs to him about how busy he is now and Neville nods politely. “There’s so much to do,” he concurs and she looks grateful. He’s already told her that he’s sorry for her loss, has already seen her cry her eyes out. That’s the thing, about funerals, that you have to go home afterwards, that you have to keep going. That he has to sit here and be polite while she smiles gently, pale and scrawny and not the same anymore, never the same again. 

Finally, Harry gets home, and he kisses Mrs Weasleys cheek, tells her they’ll go for a walk and then grabs Neville by the arm. Seeing him like this, with his regular mess of hair, his old oversized T-shirt on, things almost seem normal. This doesn’t seem like the man they say killed Voldemort, and it’s hard for Neville to believe it, even if he was there to see it. 

“How are you doing?” Harry asks, when they’ve made it out to the road, walking down towards the town.

“I’m doing good,” Neville says simply. “You? You’re staying with the Weasleys?”

He looks out over the fields. “Yeah. Don’t really have anywhere else to go, didn’t want to stay by myself in Grimmauld Place. And Arthur and Molly, they need some people around.”

Asking if Ginny is alright, if Ron is alright, seems useless. Of course they’re not. 

They walk in silence, only the crunching of the gravel under their feet.

“I heard what you did. With the DA, with Ginny,” Harry says, green eyes looking both sad and grateful. “I wanted to say thank you. It feels good to know you… I don’t want to say took over after me. You did more with the DA than I, than we, ever did.”

“I don’t know what to say, Harry,” he mumbles. Several people have thanked him, in the last weeks, and he never knows what to say. ‘You’re welcome’ seems too large, ‘No problem’, seems too small. He didn’t do it by himself, and he doesn’t deserve all this thanks, but he won’t say it wasn’t hard. “Thank you too.”

Harry shakes his head, so very serious. “No, let’s not,” he says.

“Are you joining the Aurors this fall then?” Neville says, changes the subject. 

“Yeah, I think so. They said they wanted me, and what else am I gonna do?”

“Yeah, they talked to me too. I haven’t really decided yet, what to do.”

He doesn’t want to. He wants to help, sure. There are still a lot of Death Eaters out there, still a lot of clean up. That’s what the Auror who talked to Neville called it, ‘clean up’. Like the entire war was a an oil spill, or a natural disaster. Like no one is to blame, especially not the Ministry. Maybe Harry thinks he can change that, now that the Ministry is under different rule. That sort of faith is nice. He thinks about what Snape said about niceness. 

“Thank you for talking to the Ministry about Snape,” he says and Harry stops walking, awkwardly.

“He did a lot of good work,” Harry says, sounding very diplomatic. 

Neville wants to laugh at that, while he turns around to face him. “He’s still a dick, Harry.”

They smile at each other. “Okay. Yeah,” Harry says, shrugging. “I wasn’t sure if…” 

‘He says he loves me’, Neville wants to say but Snape has never said that and he can’t bear to lie. “I don’t really know how it happened,” he says instead, has learnt from his conversation with Seamus. 

“I don’t know if you know this but he showed me memories. When he… When we thought he was dying, he let me have some of his memories,” Harry says, squinting in the afternoon sun. His hair in this light is more dark brown than black, and he looks more mature than Neville has ever seen him. He can understand now, how people look at him and see a hero.

Neville nods, he did know that, overheard some ministry official gossip about it. He can still go unnoticed if he wants to, at least sometimes. Not everyone has studied the Prophet’s war articles, knows him from the pictures. It’s comforting, that he can at least go outside without people recognizing him, that he can be unnoticed if he wants to. He’s most often not a person who wants to be noticed. 

“Yeah, to explain things. Of him and Dumbledore talking. And him talking to you, about me and giving me the sword.”

Neville blushes, can’t help himself. He did not know that part. That must be the conversation where he cried and Snape told him that the sword was a fake, that he was a double agent. He hopes Harry doesn’t notice how red his cheeks are. Harry would never say anything about it anyhow. 

“I think he… Well, you’d know better than me,” Harry says, looking at the ground. “Anyway, I’m not judging you. Worse things have come from war than people loving each other.”

If possible, Neville blushes even more at that. He doesn’t know what to say, so he says nothing, just stands there on the gravel road and stares at him, shuffles his feet.

“Did he ever tell you about what I had to do? About Dumbledore’s plan for me?” he asks slowly and gently and Neville shakes his head vigorously. 

“No,” he says, hurriedly. “No, we hardly talked about the war at all. Just, just that time I think.”

Harry nods and then they’re quiet. The guise of ‘taking a walk’ has fallen apart, and they don’t move, just look out across the fields. 

Neville wants to ask him what to do, with his life, with Snape, with anything. But Harry wouldn’t understand. Not what he has with Snape, not this lack of purpose. Harry has always had a purpose, whether he knew it or not. Something as grandiose as a destiny. He still has, even now when Voldemort is gone. Neville, on the other hand, has never had that. He has never had a purpose. He doesn’t now either. But maybe a purpose is something you make for yourself? He hopes that’s true.

They walk back to the house together, change the subject to more pleasant things, talk about quidditch, about Ron thinking of joining George at Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes, about Ginny going back to school. It’s all they can do, start to walk back home.

\--

Neville walks on a road he’s never been on, in a city he’s never been in, glancing down at the paper in his hand every other second. On the paper is Snape’s spindly writing, describing how to walk from the nearest and safest place to Apparate, to Spinner’s End. Now, when Neville is actually here, he finds it hard to read, wishes he’d written back to ask for a more detailed route. He should have asked Snape to meet him, he’s strong enough for that now. Or, that’s what the healers tell him. He hasn’t seen Snape since that first morning, when they sat on the roof together. 

He almost misses the little sign on the door that says Snape, above the mail slot, has already taken two or three steps past it when it registers in his head. The house is unassuming, looks just like the others, with dark brick walls and drawn curtains. It’s fitting, he thinks, as he stands there and stare, debates whether to go in or not. It looks just as uninviting as Snape at first glance.

He shifts his feet, looks down the street where a boy is riding his bike shakily, up and down. He thinks about Colin Creevey’s body, how he will never stop thinking about Colin Creevey’s body. He thinks about the Carrows, now in Azkaban. He thinks about Snape’s voice, before Voldemort sliced his throat open, and after the venom got in his body and wrecked it inside and out.

Maybe he won’t go in. Maybe they’re both too broken, for this, for whatever they can have here. Maybe he goes in and they try and they try and they still can’t make anything of it, find that these differences that before never matter, now matters a lot. Maybe Snape will change his mind, now that it’s not exciting, now that they don’t have to hide it, don’t have to sneak around. Maybe Neville himself does, decides that Snape is too old for him, is too much of a sad, bitter man. Maybe, Snape will be nothing more than a story Neville tells someone else, in some other bed, in some other town and some other house.

Although maybe that won’t happen. Maybe, if Neville walks in through the door and through the house, he’ll find that backyard Snape talked about. Maybe the house has potential. Maybe, in the backyard, there is space for Neville to grow something. Maybe, in the backyard, he can plant something – thyme and rosemary and potatoes and beans. A garden.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it, the end, it feels very strange to let it go! Thank you for reading, hope you liked it and that you have a really lovely day!


End file.
